arnest hopes that I myself should be in the force.
Apparently your military advisers in this matter seek to persuade you
that a "military policy" has nothing to do with "moral effect." If so,
their militarism is like that of the Aulic Council of Vienna in the
Napoleonic Wars, and not like that of Napoleon, who stated that in war
the moral was to the material as two to one. These advisers will do
well to follow the teachings of Napoleon and not those of the pedantic
militarists of the Aulic Council, who were the helpless victims of
Napoleon."

Secretary Baker replied with a reiteration of his refusal. Roosevelt
made one further attempt. When the Draft Law passed Congress, carrying
with it the authorization to use volunteer forces, he telegraphed the
President asking permission to raise two divisions, and four if so
directed. The President replied with a definite negative, declaring that
his conclusions were "based entirely upon imperative considerations
of public policy and not upon personal or private choice." Meanwhile
applications had been received from over three hundred thousand
men desirous of joining Roosevelt's volunteer force, of whom it was
estimated that at least two hundred thousand were physically fit, double
the number needed for four divisions. That a single private citizen,
by "one blast upon his bugle horn" should have been able to call forth
three hundred thousand volunteers, all over draft age, was a tremendous
testimony to his power. If his offer had been accepted when it was first
made, there would have been an American force on the field in France
long before one actually arrived there. It was widely believed, among
men of intelligence and insight, not only in America but in Great
Britain and France, that the arrival of such a force, under the command
of a man known, admired, and loved the world over, would have been a
splendid reinforcement to the Allied morale and a sudden blow to the
German confidence. But the Administration would not have it so.

I shall never forget one evening with Theodore Roosevelt on a speaking
tour which he was making through the South in 1912. There came to our
private car for dinner Senator Clarke of Arkansas and Jack Greenway,
young giant of football fame and experience with the Rough Riders in
Cuba. After dinner, Jack, who like many giants, is one of the most
diffident men alive, said hesitatingly:

"Colonel, I've long wanted to ask you something."

"Go right ahead