This offer was placed immediately by General Foch before the French war-council at the front, a council including Premier Clemenceau, Commander-in-Chief Pétain, and Louis Loucheur, Minister of Munitions, and was immediately accepted. American Army orders went forth in French from that day. And on those orders the army was presently scattered through the vast reserve army, from Flanders with the British to Verdun with the Italians and the French. They were not to go into actual battle, except near their own sectors, till the third monster drive, in July, for General Foch makes a religion of the reserve army and Fabian tactics. But they spread through the battle-line from Switzerland to the sea, as General Pershing had suggested, and "all we have" was at work.
Paris acclaimed the move royally. La Liberté wrote: "General Pershing yesterday took, in the name of his country, action which was grand in its simplicity and of moving beauty. In a few words, without adornment, but in which vibrated an accent of chivalrous passion, General Pershing made to France the offer of an entire people. 'Take all,' he said; 'all is yours.' The honor Pershing claims is shared by us, and it is with the sentiment of real pride that our soldiers will greet into their ranks those of the New World who come to them as brothers."
Secretary Baker, from American General Headquarters, gave out a statement. "I am delighted at General Pershing's prompt and effective action," he said, "in placing all the American troops and facilities at the disposal of the Allies in the present situation.
"It will be met with hearty approval in the United States, where the people desire their expeditionary force to be of the utmost service in the common cause. I have visited all the American troops in France, some of them recently, and had an opportunity to observe the enthusiasm with which officers and men received the announcement that they would be used in the present conflict. One regiment to which the announcement was made spontaneously broke into cheers."
The British Government issued an official statement on the night of April 1: "As a result of communications which have passed between the Prime Minister and President Wilson; of deliberations between Secretary Baker, who visited London a few days ago, and the Prime Minister, Mr. Balfour, and Lord Derby, and consultations in France in which General Pershing and General Bliss participated, important decisions have been come to by which large forces of trained men in the American Army can be brought to the assistance of the Allies in the present struggle.
"The government of our great Western ally is not only sending large numbers of American battalions to Europe during the coming critical months, but has agreed to such of its regiments as cannot be used in divisions of their own being brigaded with French and British units so long as the necessity lasts.
"By this means troops which are not sufficiently trained to fight as divisions and army corps will form part of seasoned divisions, until such time as they have completed their training and General Pershing wishes to withdraw them in order to build up the American Army.
"Throughout these discussions President Wilson has shown the greatest anxiety to do everything possible to assist the Allies, and has left nothing undone which could contribute thereto.
"This decision, however of vital importance it will be to the maintenance of the Allied strength in the next few months, will in no way diminish the need for those further measures for raising fresh troops at home to which reference has already been made.
"It is announced at once, because the Prime Minister feels that the singleness of purpose with which the United States have made this immediate and, indeed, indispensable contribution toward the triumph of the Allied cause should be clearly recognized by the British people."