If we have 100,000 I. W. W. members such as these yet among us, and internment camps full of Germans and pro-Germans, would there not seem need for a house cleaning? It is time now for a new American point of view. We are not going to allow America to be used as it has been by these men. _Fear_ at least they shall understand. CHAPTER XI THE SLACKER RAIDS How the A. P. L. Made Patriots—Chasing the Slacker—Teaching the Love of the Flag—Incidents of Western Raids. Even had Mr. Bryan’s famous prophecy come true, that a million armed men would spring up over night and so end at once any trouble America might presumably experience in going to war, there still would have existed a vast deficit in our Army, which at the time of the Armistice had more than two million men armed and on the soil of France, almost as many in training, and ten times as many listed as army material if needed—although, to be sure, they had not sprung up either armed or equipped, as perhaps France or Great Britain could testify. The new draft ages of 18 to 45 swept in a vast additional army under the latest conscription act, although the first registration, those of 21 to 31, had set on foot our first American forces—as fine soldiers as ever stood on leather. A great many phrases are made in time of war about war itself, and most of these come around to the ancient recruiting sergeant’s inviting motto recounting the glory of dying for one’s country. The Napoleonic wars were fought on the death-or-glory basis; but Napoleon got his troops by rigid conscription. We fought this war on a more sober basis of necessity. Most of us who are old enough and wise enough to study human nature and world politics knew that commercial jealousy, and not any abstract theories about democracy and the rights of man, lay basically under this war, as they have lain under most other wars. And the boys of the world—youth being resilient, of high pulse and low blood pressure, and believing, as youth always does, that nothing wrong can happen to youth and hope—were called on once more to fight the wars of the world, as the boys always have been asked to do. Youth and middle age volunteered, old age itself volunteered, but the truth became obvious that our volunteer army would not spring armed over night in sufficient numbers. In fairness, we passed our draft acts, euphonically termed “Selective Service Acts,” it being intended that this action should bring America to its focus, and should put under arms warm and lukewarm lovers of our flag alike. As it seems to this writer, that originally was unfair only in that it made the maximum service age too low. It cast the burden of the war on the boys, the young men, most of whom had never felt hate against any country, and knew little about the causes of this war; for soldiers often do not really know why they fight.