ites
such as flavorings, fruits, candy and potatoes in proportion, while for
smokers, there were 761,000,000 rations of cigarettes and tobacco in
other forms.

It is difficult to describe in exact figures what the American
expeditionary forces have done in the construction and improvement of
dockage and warehouses since the first troops landed. This work has
been proportionate to the whole effort in other directions. Ten steamer
berths have been built at Bordeaux, having a total length of 4,100 feet.
At Montoir, near St. Nazaire, eight berths were under construction with
a total length of over 3,200 feet.

Great labor had been expended in dredging operations, repairing French
docks and increasing railway terminal facilities. Warehouses having
an aggregate floor area of almost 23,000,000 square feet had been
constructed. This development of French ports increased facilities to
such an extent that even if the Germans had captured Calais and other
channel ports, as they had planned, the allies' loss would have been
strategically unimportant.

So largely were facilities increased that the English armies could have
had their bases at the lower French ports, if necessary. In other words,
American work in port construction lessened to a material degree the
value to the Germans of their proposed capture of the channel ports.

These figures serve in a measure to show the magnitude of American
accomplishments, and the great machine is in operation today as the
American Third army moves forward into German territory.

During the second stage of the Argonne operation a captured German
major, while in casual conversation with an American officer said: "We
know defeat is inevitable. We know your First and Second armies are
operating and that your Third army is nearly ready to function. We know
there are more and more armies to follow. We can measure your effort.
The end must come soon."

AMERICAN FORCES AND CASUALTIES

At the opening of November, 1918, the United States armies on all fronts
numbered about 2,200,000 men, and was being increased at an average rate
of 250,000 a month. In transit from home ports to ports in Europe and
Siberia, only one transport ship was lost, and of its complement of
troops 126 men were drowned. The sinking was caused by collision with
another ship in the same convoy, not by an enemy submarine. The United
States has not lost one man in transport, by an act of a hostile ship or
submarine.

Arm