CHAPTER XXXI
LAFAYETTE, WE’RE HERE
One of the great moments of this war was when General Pershing, newly arrived in France, was escorted in state to the tomb of the man who, in his ardent youth, left the most luxurious court in Europe, crossed the seas and offered his sword to George Washington.
The President of the French republic, the commander of the French army, with other dignitaries of the state and army, were in that escorting party, and when they approached the tomb they paused in silence, with bared heads, to hear what General Pershing should say. They expected a formal speech, but I do not think General Pershing could have made a speech just then. What he felt was too deep and too moving. His hand touched the hilt of his sword and then the hand went out toward the marble, and General Pershing said simply:
“Lafayette, we’re here.”
After the passing of a hundred and forty years we are in France to pay our debt, to offer our sword, the sword of America, to the cause of liberty. Whoever says we are fighting a profiteers’ war or a politicians’ war utters a lying slander. Whoever intimates that we shall ever sheathe the sword of America until the war is won, and the world is safe, simply does not know the facts, nor the temper of our army.
To make the world safe for democracy. That phrase has been repeated so many times that it has become almost a colloquialism. It is used in jest sometimes. But it is written on the hearts of the millions of men who have gone out to die, if need be, to make that dream a reality.
Whatever confusion of thought there may have been in the minds of the first armies that rushed out against the German invasion, there is no confusion or misunderstanding in the minds of those who fight to-day. The Belgians and the French fought first to save their homes. The British fought because they knew that their homes would next be endangered. The Russians and the Italians fought because they were attacked.
No doubt there was in the consciousness of some European statesmen the hope of territorial gains, or diplomatic advantages to follow after an allied victory. But that has all vanished now, drowned in the blood of the brave at Malines, Louvain, the Marne, Verdun, Rheims, Cantigny, Château Thierry, St. Michiel. Europe, except that part of it still ruled by Attila and his slaves, has purged itself of the old statesmanship, the old sinuous, scheming diplomacy.
There will never be any more Metternichs, or Talleyrands or Castlereaghs, never any more secret agreements between kings and statesmen. The old order has perished and now we have freemen fighting under leaders like Wilson, Lloyd George, Clemenceau, to make the world free.
The hope of the toiling masses all over the world, the vision of seers and prophets and poets since the dawn of time; the dreams dreamed in garrets, in city slums, in the snows of Siberia, on gallows high, on the sacred cross. The world set free. Free from the oppression of tyrants claiming divine rights; free from the cold exploitation of privilege; free from poverty and all the crime and prostitution and death that rise like a hideous miasma from the mire of poverty; free from war!