ration of the German War Office with
Lenine and Trotsky. And stories of daring and pluck that saved men's
lives and kept the North Russians from a despairing surrender to the
Bolsheviki.

Meanwhile England was taking measures herself to support these men so as
to form a nucleus for the larger expedition when it should be
inaugurated by the Allied Supreme War Council. But the total number of
British officers and men who could be spared for the purpose, in view of
the critical situation on the Western Front, was less than 1,200. And
these had to be divided between the widely separated areas of Murmansk
and Archangel. And the officers and men sent were nearly all, to a man,
those who had already suffered wounds or physical exhaustion on the
Western Front. This was late in June. About this time the plan of the
Allied Supreme War Council as already stated was, under strict
limitations, acceded to by President Wilson, and the doughboys of the
339th Infantry in July found themselves in England hearing about
Archangel and disgustedly exchanging their Enfields for the Russian
rifles.

For various reasons the command of the expedition was assigned by
General Foch to General Poole, the British officer who had been so
enthusiastic about rolling up a big volunteer army of North Russians to
go south to Petrograd and wipe out the Red dictatorate and re-establish
the old hard-fighting Russian Front on the East. Naturally, American
soldiers who fought that desperate campaign in North Russia now feel
free to criticize the judgment of General Foch in putting General Poole
in command. It appears from the experiences of the soldiers up there
that for military, for diplomatic and for political reasons it would
have been better to put an American general in command of the
expedition. And while we are at it we might as well have our little say
about President Wilson. We think he erred badly in judgment. He either
should have sent a large force of Americans into North Russia--as we did
into Cuba--a force capable of doing up the job quickly and thoroughly,
or sent none at all. He should have known that the American doughboy
fights well for a cause, but that a British general would have a hard
time convincing the Americans of the justice of a mixed cause. This is
confession of a somewhat blind prejudice which the American citizen has
against the aggressive action of British arms wherever on the globe they
may be seen in action, no matter how ju