During these two years and its importance today . Julie yeah, so, the mexican expedition and the border needs to be understood in the context of the mexican revolution. That is a conflict begins in 1910 with the ouster of a longstanding dictator of mexico. He is ousted by a man named francisco madero. He himself is killed soon after, and after he is killed, several revolutionary factions emerge from that. One of the factions that emerges is a faction under a man that is called the constitutionalist. One of the people who is aligned with the constitutionalist is Francisco Pancho villa. Now, by 1914, the contitutionalists had become successful. They have largely managed to control a large part of the country. And at this point of success, pancho villa breaks with the constitutionalists. He is successful militarily against carranza for a long time, but during 1915 he actually has a series of military reverses against the current government. So he goes from having an army that is about 30,000 to 50,000 people operating mostly in the north of mexico, to having about 500 to 1000 troops under his command. And it is sort of this low point in his military career. He decides to start attacking americans at the border. He does this for a couple of different reasons. One is to stay relevant in the fight, in the revolution. The other is that Woodrow Wilson, who is president of the u. S. At that time, recognizes the current government in mexico as the rightful government. And pancho villa believes that this is due to a corrupt bargain that essentially carranza has given Woodrow Wilson secret claims to mineral rights or land rights in northern mexico in exchange for being recognized by the government. This allows carranza to actually buy arms from the United States, whereas pancho villa cannot. That is why he starts stepping up attacks on the border. First he attacks a train, leading to loss of life of americans. And then on march 9, 1916, his forces attacked the town of columbus, new mexico in the middle of the night. One column attacks the town and largely burns down the downtown. And one column attacks an Army Garrison at the camp right outside of town. Steve so we are going to watch the film in just a moment, but in order to better understand the border and what it was like back then clearly it is in the headlines today with the debate over the wall, but what was it like in 1916 . What would we have seen if we traveled to that area . Julie so, on the u. S. Side, you would find a remarkably safe border, considering that there was a very large war going on on the other side. Much of the mexican revolution, many of the major battles take place over the border around northern mexico. Chihuahua in the north. Many of the revolutionary leaders end up being from sonora, which is also in the north. The north of mexico is a very dangerous place. There arent many refugees coming over the border at that time to escape the fighting in northern mexico. On the u. S. Side, there are not that many attacks, considering the danger and the longstanding conflict that happens very, very close by to american soil. So there is the columbus, new mexico raid. 10 civilians are killed in that raid, eight soldiers are, before the mexican expedition is sent into new mexico to try to capture and kill pancho villa in retribution for the loss of life at columbus. There is a raid that happens also in may a little bit after that, so 1916, in a smaller town also pretty close by to columbus. But there are not really a whole lot of other raids that happen around that time. There are some shots that sometimes make it into the u. S. , but it is actually shockingly safe considering the scale of the conflict. Steve and yet, do you find it ironic that a century later, a different type of conflict, but still some of the same issues. Julie yeah, it is definitely interesting we are having a lot of the same issues today. Of course, the border is a different place. At that time, there was no border fence. Obviously there was no border wall. The border was relatively open. You could just walk across in most places. There were even some places in el paso and other towns where they had bars straddling the border so you could walk into the bar on one side and drink on the other side of the border. So it was really very open to back and forth travel between the two countries. Steve so lets roll the silent film. And if you are in a movie house in 1916 in the audience, what do you think the theatergoers would have thought about this . What would have been going through their minds . Julie i think they would have thought that it was a grand adventure, actually. Because the mexican expedition is a unique and interesting transitional point for the u. S. Army. Because it is really the last major Army Operation that uses horse cavalry. So, you have horses hitting the trail, camping for months at a time, really independently, as opposed to world war i, which happens right afterwards, which is large, major operations in trenches and in many ways doesnt have that sort of romantic, frontier feel that the mexican expedition certainly had. The mexican expedition though is interesting too, as youll see, because it is really the first time that the army uses trucks and airplanes in the field. So i think that people would have been interested in the sort of spirit of adventure and change that it embodies. Steve and of course all of this is chronicled in your book. The cover of your book, do you know where it was taken . Julie i do not know exactly where it is taken. It is march, 1916 in northern mexico. So it would have been somewhere in chihuahua. But you can see in the film, there is a Similar Group of men around a camp fire. Steve the film begins with a march to one of those encampments. So as we watch this, give us a sense of what are we looking at. Julie we are looking at infantry, and we are looking at mounted artillery. And i think we are going to see calvary first. This is what i am talking about, in terms of the sort of adventure that the mexican expedition would have held for people, because horse calvary had been used very extensively in the indian wars in the north of mexico and in the indian wars in the southwest of the u. S. From the 1880s to about this time. But this is really the last major Army Operation that uses them. And you can see the units are although this looks like a lot of people, having 100, 200 people together in a group of horse calvary is a much smaller unit than what would have been used in, say, world war i. So, it was a small number of men on horses on the trail. Steve arriving from where . Where do the recruits come from . Julie these are probably not recruits, these are probably regulars in the u. S. Army. These are career people, and they would have been coming from probably elsewhere in the southwest at first. So initially in the expedition, you have that 4800 troops. By the end, you have about 10,000 come down. So, some of them might have come from somewhere else besides the southwest. But at least initially, that is where they are coming from. The other thing is that the army at this time is much smaller than it is during world war i. There are only about 25,000 troops in the continental u. S. At this time, regulars. And the whole army is around 120,000, 130,000 people, compared to the millions who were fighting in france. This is actually a very small force. Steve and i ask you this in terms of context as we see these men arriving at their camp. The civil war ended in 1865, world war i was beginning to hover in europe in 1913, 1914. What was the u. S. Military like . How prepared were we for these kinds of conflicts . Julie well like i said, it is very small. A lot of the army is actually in farflung, remote places. A lot of them are in the philippines. A lot of them are in the panama canal zone. So you had these very small units in sort of farflung small camps in the United States, often times in the west. So you had the sort of small garrisons that in the southwest, at least, are really focused on capturing indian tribes. So, in the 1880s, they were essentially crossing the border back and forth between the u. S. And mexico, trying to catch the last of the apaches. Steve this appears to be a training mission. Is that correct . Julie this does look like training. So, before, you could see the signal corps, and they were they seemed to be setting up a portable telegraph machine. Now you see calvary training. So, again, this is a relatively small unit. Probably training and practicing how to move together in the field. Probably outside of either on the border at fort bliss or at the main camp that general pershing set up in northern mexico, which is their main headquarters through most of the mexican expedition. Steve and again, this is how they saw it back in 1916 in movie houses, correct . Julie that is a good question. So, this might have been seen in movie houses, it might have been seen as part of the newsreel. It was filmed by the signal corps. They do seem to have cut this together to essentially show the material both that the u. S. Army used during the mexican expedition and the material they needed Going Forward in world war i. So, part of the point of this film seems to have been to show some of the deficiencies in armaments and materials, and to make a case presumably for receiving more of it, and receiving more funding. Steve do you have any insights into how they trained the horses to carry the arsenal and the personnel . Julie that is a good question. I really dont know how they trained all of the horses. They used horses pretty extensively. They also used mules. You can see earlier in the film, we did not remark, but they used a lot of pack mules as well. Now you dont see them. But anyway, you do see a lot of pack mules as well. There was a lot of animal power that went into the old army and the functioning of the old army. Although i will say that pack mules, even though they were used extensively in the expedition, were pretty problematic in terms of what they could do, because they could, of course, carry large amounts of material down from the border to the advance headquarters for pershing. But because chihuahua is a desert, it is very dry, the mules actually had to carry their own fodder down to mexico. So they cant carry as much materials, which is part of why pershing turned to using trucks for the first time as part of the expedition, instead of just relying on animal power, even though trucks had really been untested as far as the u. S. Army was concerned. Steve general pershing, they called him blackjack pershing. A significant player in the modern military, correct . Julie yes. A very significant player. He had up until now an illustrious career. He had also been governor in the philippines. This is the first time he is really given a large army to command. So this is sort of a testing ground also, not only for new material for the army, but for John Pershing himself. He is able to prove himself in the field, he is able to command large units. He like i said, he tests new material, and he is able to show that he is an innovative leader and that he is able to attract a large degree of talent to him and loyalty from the soldiers, which was something that not every commander could do in the field. Steve they are going for their morning bath and had their own barber. Looking at all of this, there had to be a tremendous amount of support staff to handle the horses and all that came with that, of course, and just the basic needs of the men in the military. And they were all men at that time. Julie they were all men. So, there is a huge amount of support staff. In fact, there were so many, and they had to gear up so quickly that they actually do have to hire civilians to do some jobs, which caused a lot of resentment. Because civilians do ultimately have to do things like drive trucks and they are paid more than the soldiers at first. So pershing does try to eliminate civilian labor as much as he possibly can. Steve and of course indoctrination is key because they were in close quarters, especially during the time of the year where there could have been infestations of mosquitoes and hot temperatures along the u. S. mexico border. Julie right. There are really extremes of temperatures in chihuahua because chihuahua is a desert. But it also has high elevation. The men also encountered snow, cold weather, dust storms, in addition to desert weather later on in the year, in summer, and they would have been inoculated against typhoid fever and possibly smallpox in camp. And there is a relatively low rate of disease because of the armys vaccination schedule. Steve did others learn from that, did civilians learn from these vaccination programs . Julie that is a good question. I think to some degree, yes, it was a good testing ground for vaccinations in general and the efficacy of vaccinations. Especially in these places where you had large groups of people in close quarters. Steve and these soldiers who needed three meals a day. Julie they did, although the horse cavalry were often sent off with only three days of rations. They went out with very little food, very few supplies. And oftentimes, when they are not in camp, they are responsible for supplying themselves. So they are responsible for either finding cattle and slaughtering them and cooking them in the field, or purchasing whatever they can. So sometimes, they are able to purchase things in hard currency. Sometimes, they have to issue ious, which makes it very hard for mexicans to receive compensation. Steve is this a form of hazing back in 1916 . Julie that is a good question. I hadnt actually seen this before, but it looks fun. I will say, even though a lot of these sort of regulars that participated were career army soldiers, you do have a lot of National Guardsmen who are coming into the National Guard for the first time. Lots of college students, lots of young men who are looking for adventure and to have a good time. Steve and some down time, including playing with the mascot. Julie yeah, the army has dogs. The navy always adopts they always seem to adopt animals on the trail. Steve how do they keep them motivated . It seems based on what you wrote in their book, there was a lot of downtime. They had to train, but there was not always a battle they had to go to. Julie most of the time they didnt always have a battle to go to and they spent most of their time training, especially after june. From march to june, they are on the trail actively searching for pancho villa. But after that, they really spend a great deal of their time in camp training. And for the National Guardsmen, that is true really of the nine months that they are there. They really do not see action, but they do spend every day usually hiking, doing six to seven miles of hiking a day, doing drills, and that kind of thing. Steve i want to jump in, because as we look at the modern air force and navy pilots today, and what they operate, this was only 100 years ago. And yet look how far we have come. What is this . Julie so, this is kind of interesting because this is the captain, who was the commander of the first aero squadron in the mexican expedition. You can see him there in the center, sitting down in the hat. But this plane was not on the expedition. This looks like a Wright Brothers model a. And in fact, the planes that they took on the expedition were jm3s called jennys from the curtis company. And even those planes that they took, the jennys, were really quite inadequate for military use at the time. This is an even older plane that we see here. This is a plane that is about six, seven years older than that. So this is really not a plane that had a lot of military use, but even the jn3s, the jennys, they came in with eight to begin with. They only really are in service in mexico for about a month and a half. Six of them crashed. Two of them are cannibalized for parts. They really dont do well in the field. And part of the reason for that is that they go into spin very easily. They cannot climb past 10,000 feet. And in fact, the peaks in chihuahua are about 10,000 feet. So they cannot clear the crest of the mountains. And because of that, they really do crash relatively quickly. Steve we move from the planes to another part of the silent film. As we look at this screen and these gentlemen sitting front and center outside their camp. Explain this office and what they represent. Julie the two men that are sitting there, one is general hoyt, he is in command of the department of texas for a time. He retired, i believe, right after this. So he is, as you can see, he is quite aged already. But the department of the south is commanded by frederick. He is not in here. But he would have been the superior to hoyte. Steve and now we move from that to the supply wagons and the equipment train as they try to move it from one part of the country to these Training Camps and then to the front lines. Julie yeah. So here, you have wagons that are drawn by horses. Wagons, like i said, are used in the early part of the expedition. So, wagons, pack mules, trucks are used later. Wagons can only carry a certain amount of material, a little bit over a ton, but they really cannot carry a lot of material up steep grades. Which is part of the reason why pershing turns to trucks instead of wagons. Steve how common were these trains used by the military . Julie trains are used very commonly by the military north of the border. They are not allowed to use the mexican railways south of the border after march 18. So about a week into the expedition, they are prevented doing so by an order by carranza. They actually do have to use pack animals instead. Steve we move from that to the doughboys, which many would associate with those troops in world war i, but also associated with these troops along the u. S. mexico border. Julie yeah. So, they have an explanation for where the term doughboy came from. The term it is unclear actually what the origin of the term is. It seems to be older than the civil war. But it is usually used to refer to American Expeditionary forces in world war i. There are a lot of stories of how they got that name. There is one there. Sometimes people say it is because of the dirt that soldiers got on their uniforms so it looked like flour. Some people say it is because of the fried dough that they ate. Maybe also on the trail or in the field, but it is not entirely clear where that comes from. Steve and generally speaking, were they well taken care of . Were there complaints or did most of the soldiers feel that they had what they needed . Julie they do have some problems early on with supplying troops. So troops do not have proper uniforms when they go into mexico much of the time. They had summer uniforms. They are going to fight in the desert, so the army does not bother to supply them with things like wool blankets for the first few weeks. It is cold in mexico in the north, in chihuahua, so they do have some deficiencies early on. Later on, they are able to get large amounts of material into northern mexico to supply the troops. By i would say may or so, they really have more than enough of what they need. They really become much more comfortable. And in fact, they have a lot of what they did in camp. A lot of what they dont need is supplied by locals. So you have locals who set up Small Businesses right around the camp selling things like alcohol and sundries to the troops. Steve and this is in fort bliss. Again, a lot of training took place especially in southern texas. Julie yeah, thats right. Thats really most of what they did, is try to get these people up to shape. Getting them up to military speed. These are people who really did not have any military experience before they come to the border. Oftentimes, they are brandnew recruits. And they come through really having a lot of military experience afterwards. They spend nine months on the border drilling, training, going out on hikes that were sometimes days, weeks at a time, and patrolling the border. Going back and forth across their zone of the border, making sure nothing is going on. Of course, most of them dont run into trouble on the border. It ends up being purely a training exercise. Steve what is this . Julie this is the artillery. The illfated 10th cavalry. The 10th calvary and the ninth cavalry, which they showed earlier, is a unit of Buffalo Soldiers. That means africanamerican enlisted men who are commanded by white officers. Although, there is actually one black officer who comes with the expedition, and he is only the third person to have graduated from west point third africanamerican person to have graduated from west point. That is mayor charles young, that is major charles young, although they dont show him in the film. The 10th, they say illfated. It is illfated because they do see action in mexico. They are part of a skirmish. They are supposed to walk through essentially carrizal to do reconnaissance in a town. They run into government forces. Eight of them are killed, 23 are captured. So 23 of them spend about a week, week and a half as prisoners in chihuahua city before their release is negotiated. Although by all accounts, they were very well treated in chihuahua city. They actually are visited on a daily basis by the British Consul and by the u. S. Consul. So they are well taken care of. Steve it looks windy there with a lot of dust. Julie the weather is certainly difficult and changeable in chihuahua. Here also you can see the difficulty of the terrain because you have desert. But the desert rises up from the Central Plain in this state. You can see right here that there are not a lot of roads running through what is really a difficult place to get across. There is not a lot of infrastructure to speak of. I mentioned railroads. There is two railroads running through the state at that time, northsouth, there is a couple of lines running off that, a couple of major roads, but there really are not a lot going south once you get south of some of the border towns. It is really a very challenging landscape to get across. Steve and limited munitions at the moment. Julie yes. They had very limited munitions. They dont use that much artillery actually in the expedition itself, but they do have very little of it in the army in general. And again, in that regard, because they are not using artillery too much for the expedition, this is one part where i think they are looking ahead towards world war i and they are looking ahead towards the armies of europe and seeing that they are quite lacking in terms of some of the materials that are being used commonly in france. Steve this may be an obvious question, but as we look at this and setting up for some sort of battle, how do they know where to go . What type of reconnaissance operation did they have, if any . Julie that is a very good question. This is part of the reason they never find pancho villa. Unfortunately, they had a poor reconnaissance and a very poor intelligence system. They dont have a lot of intelligence on the ground to speak of. They dont have a lot of people who they can talk to that can give them Accurate Information and tell them where to go. Steve looks like this is what he is trying to do right here. Julie he might also be trying to get the topography of the land, because they have maps that are very inadequate. Many of their maps actually dated from the mexicanamerican war, so 1848. So they go in with really poor maps, a poor sense of the topography of mexico. They also go in with the wrong uniforms in some cases. They go in with summer uniforms. They need woolens to deal with the mountain weather. They have a lot of challenges in the first three months of the expedition until it gets a little bit warmer. In terms of intelligence also, they dont have a lot of intelligence on the ground, but also pancho villa is a very savvy actor. He has a lot of years of experience evading capture himself. He is very good at not telling people his plans. He is actually injured in march of the expedition, and he hides in a cave for much of the next five months and tells very few people where he is. So it is actually very difficult to find him. Steve when did he pass away . Julie 1923. So he actually makes it through the whole revolution. Steve the screen says they are getting ready for a telegraph. So again, a very early, cursory type of information to get across from where they are, i assume back here to washington, d. C. . Julie yeah, they would have wanted to communicate with washington, d. C. , obviously with wilson and with baker. But they also would have wanted to communicate with fort bliss and some of the areas around the border as well, to see where materials are coming. So they would have wanted both, actually. There are very few because chihuahua again is so remote and underdeveloped and has seen so many years of war and so many years of destruction, there are very few telegraph poles running through that area of the country at the time of the expedition. So the soldiers did have to set up telegraph lines essentially through part of northern mexico. They do that both through more permanent stations, which you saw, so telephone poles, and then also running buzzer wire, which is unprotected copper wire that you put across the desert from point a to point b. And, of course, that is very vulnerable to destruction by weather or horses or men crossing over. But it is a temporary measure. Steve and this looks like an infirmary . Julie it does look like an infirmary. Again, this is probably part of their training, which is part of the reason why they film it. You can see they dont yet have ambulance cars. They dont yet have enough trucks to transport people who are injured on the trail necessarily in trucks, so they are still using wagons to transport people, probably over to the Main Settlement where people spend most of their time actually in expedition. So pershings headquarters. Which is actually put there in part because it is close to a mormon village that was founded in the late 19th century. It is actually where george romney, mitt romneys father, was born. Steve they had to do it all, including the construction of this pontoon bridge. Julie yes. This looks to me like again, it is a training exercise, maybe even in fort bliss. Here, they are building pontoon bridges. These are these temporary bridges that use floating crafts, like a boat, and you put you can see that you put planks essentially or preformed platforms on top of it as a temporary measure, and you can drive over it or have people go over it. Steve we are seeing a lot of the training and drills taking place. Not a lot of the actual conflict itself. Why . Julie well, it is very difficult to actually film the conflict itself. Because there are certainly conflicts, and there are certainly clashes that happened throughout. But they happened really very early on. So the expedition starts, pershing goes in march 15. They really stop patrolling northern mexico in june. After june 21, they stop patrolling outside of that headquarters area. And part of the reason for that it is because they have clashed a couple of times by then with the government forces. And wilson really doesnt want to risk a larger conflict with mexico. Because he sees that the u. S. Is probably going to enter world war i, and he cannot spare the troops. Steve where do these munitions come from . Where were they made . Julie that is a good question. They are probably made mostly on the east coast. This might be fort bliss, it might be somewhere else along the border. This would be essentially practice and demonstration of munitions, again, that are not really necessarily appropriate for Something Like the mexican expedition, but that are looking ahead towards world war i. Again, the expedition ends. They come over the border in february of 1917 and war is declared in april of 1917. So this is really something that they know is probably increasingly likely to happen as time goes on. And wilson himself, Woodrow Wilson, is really looking towards the start of world war i. He is really thinking about armaments and thinking about training in those terms. Steve as a military historian, did this inspire young men to sign up . Was that one of the motivations . Julie i think part of the motivation was the adventure of it. So being on the trail, the sort of old army. This is more of the new army, the new Technology People were using in the field, these sort of big artillery pieces where you fire indirectly. You dont fire directly. It probably did hold less romance for people. I think a lot of the younger men who volunteer actually to go down to the border see it as a chance to join the old army versus this, which is the new army. Steve just in that last scene, that looked like the technology was getting better. Julie yes, it is getting much better. Artillery is getting much longer ranges. You do have the ability to fire much greater distances, which allows you to fire not only at things you can see, but things you cant see. So something that is over a ridge, very far away. And that allows you to use, say, airplanes to fly and spot the enemy rather than you having to directly spot the enemy and then you calculate where the enemy would be. But, again, for i think a lot of the young men that volunteered, that probably seemed very impersonal. It seemed very new. It seemed very strange. And that wasnt the army they had known, the army of lore, that was really the old army, which was the horse cavalry army that really was passing away and passes away after the mexican expedition. Steve lets talk about your book, because there are things in the book that are not in the silent film. Buffalo soldiers, who were they . Julie Buffalo Soldiers are, again, these men who are part of segregated units. You have africanamerican soldiers who are commanded by white officers, mostly white officers, in the field. There are some africanamerican officers, as i mentioned. There is one on the mexican expedition, but there really arent a lot. Mostly, they are segregated units. Steve the apache scouts. Julie this is the last hurrah of the apache scouts. The apache scouts were not just apaches. They were native americans from a variety of different tribes who enlisted into the army essentially to be guides in the southwest. So during the indian wars as trackers, they worked as trackers. They worked to try to find food and water to make sure that the u. S. Army calvary could survive on the trail and that they would be able to find what they needed to find. They would go into the field oftentimes with bad maps or a poor sense of the land and the topography. But the apache scouts knew the land very well, they knew the people very well. They were able to guide u. S. Soldiers on the trail. And this is the last time they are used in the field. Steve there was no draft in 1916, correct . Julie that is correct. Steve so what about the National Guard, and what changes took place as a result of all this within the National Guard . Julie yeah, so the National Guard, the callup that wilson does originally in may is only of three states along the border. He calls up texas, arizona, and new mexicos guard, but only about 3000, 4000 soldiers show up. That is not enough to protect the length of the border. The border obviously is very long, he needs many more troops than that. So they actually extend the callup to the rest of the states. So 49 states show up and send troops, which ultimately ends up being about 110,000 on the border. Because of this, they need to vastly increase the amount of money that goes into the National Guard and the amount of training. So the National Security act of 1916 is passed. This brings a much needed infusion of money. It increases the number of training days that the National Guard gets per year, and makes sure that they receive materials at least in theory on parity with the u. S. Army, with the regulars. Steve clearly, he was a military leader. But we are still talking about general pershing today. Why was he such a significant player in this time period . Julie he is a significant player for a few different reasons. One of them is because he really does prove himself in the mexican expedition. There were very few largescale actions that the u. S. Army really engages in before world war i, in the immediate years before. And he does take 10,000 regulars into the field for a very extended period of time, for 11 months, and that makes him really unique in many regards in the u. S. Army. He is also able to engender a great deal of loyalty from his troops. His troops really like him. He seems to attract talent. There are a lot of subordinates who he mentors who seem to really thrive under him. And so he is maybe not the first, most obvious choice afterwards to lead the American Expeditionary forces of world war i but his nearest rival, the commander of the southern department, dies right after the expedition. So that clears the way for pershing to rise to become the commander of the aes. Steve and from your book, the establishment of what are described as sanitary villages . Julie yes, yes. So we saw typhoid and smallpox inoculation. This is part of the reason why the men on the expedition were so healthy, but one of the other reasons was in fact there was a system of regulated prostitution in the expedition. So pershings system was he actually designated an officer to control essentially what he called a sanitary village, which was an area where they set up huts for the women, and women were allowed to stay in the huts and stay in a clean place where they had access to medical care. The officer would do scheduling for them and make sure they were paid on time. So they were able to have relatively good working conditions, while at the same time, the men were able to have a safe environment. Steve it seems pretty incredible, though. Julie yeah, and he was really some people were really angry with pershing over the system of prostitution. Again, they were right next to a mormon town. I think a lot of the mormon elders were not very happy about this system of regulated prostitution. A lot of the medical officers were not very happy about it, but pershing stuck with it because it gave results. Steve let me go back where we began, really adding context to all of this, because world war i was going on throughout europe. The u. S. Entered after 1916, 1917, but how did all that play into what we were seeing on the u. S. Mexico border, the fact that there was a war in europe . Julie yeah, they are always cognizant of the fact that there was a war going on. They are fighting along the border, they are looking for one person in a huge state that is very vast that requires them to cover large distances in small amounts of time, and to really search through large areas of territory of land. But they know that very soon, they probably are going to join world war i. It is increasingly clear throughout the expedition that that is going to be the next fight, and that is a very different fight. It is a much more stationary fight at that time, along the very stationary lines, the trenches in world war that are along northern france. So they know that even though they are doing they are essentially engaging in one type of warfare, that they are going to have to very quickly transition to a different kind. Which i think is why you see in the film so much artillery, so much emphasis on artillery, even though they dont use it in mexico too much. They know that that is where they are headed, to places to do things that are much more stationary. Artillery pieces are big, they are heavy. You cant really drag them around a trail in northern mexico, but they are very useful in france where you have stationary trenches. So there is that. There is also things like, you know i think in a couple of places you can see machine guns. Those are going to be much more useful, say, in france than in the mexican expedition. The few that the u. S. Army had there are really pretty bad. They are pretty outdated. There is not a lot of them, but they know that that is where they are headed. Steve to underscore your earlier point, this really did provide a Training Ground for those troops who then fought in europe. Julie yeah, so part of it, even though they are fighting a very different type of war in mexico, they are able to do things like hike for several miles a day, which brings up peoples stamina. They are able to drill. They are able to shoot. They are able to do all sorts of practice on these new materials that they are getting. They are able to learn how to drive trucks. There arent that many trucks in the u. S. Army when the expedition starts. There also are not that many truck drivers. So they need to train people to do things like drive trucks and fix them, to become mechanics. And to fix these materials. They also need to train pilots. They need to find airplanes that are better than the jennys that they have. They need to train people to fix those airplanes. And they are able to do a lot of these things because they are spending 11 months in the case of the regulars, nine months in case of the National Guard on the border. A lot that time spent doing that, training people to do these jobs that hadnt existed in the army up until that time. Steve and of course, one of the reasons we wanted to look at this film is to add context to where we are today. From your book, you write the following quote. Wilsons invasion of the mexican territory in intervention in the mexican revolution created an environment of suspicion and distrust that took decades to repair and caused a general decline in relations between the United States and latin american republics. Julie yes. Steve can you elaborate . Julie it causes a decline in u. S. Mexican relations. I say it takes decades to repair. It may not have ever really been repaired. Because the wilson government, when he decides to actually intervene in mexico to go and find pancho villa, he doesnt ask necessarily for permission from carranza. He tells carranza he is going in and he has legal justifications for doing so, but he does not receive the approval of the government of mexico. And even though carranza and pancho villa are not allies at this time they are enemies, in fact and carranza himself has troops in the field trying to find poncho villa also. He has 10,000 troops also in northern mexico who are fighting. Because wilson goes in without the permission of mexico, it really causes a rift between the u. S. And the mexican government. There is already a rift, but it deepens the problems that already exist and deepens the problems with what becomes the government of mexico for the next several years. This really continues, too. So the rift continues with the government of mexico, but also in northern mexico, pancho villa, throughout much of his career, is very popular as well. So this causes a lot of bad blood among people in northern mexico against their neighbors just over the border, because they are trying to capture or kill a man who, for them, is a folk hero, is someone who they look up to and someone who was to be admired. The u. S. And in fact, they show it in the film. They call him the bandit. But one persons bandit is another persons freedom fighter. Steve to that point, what intrigued you or fascinated you the most about pancho villa . There is a picture of him in your book. It looks like he is ready for any type of military operation. Julie yeah, what intrigued me was how good he was operating in the field and how this was, again, this was a low point in his career. This was a time in which he had a very small number of troops under his disposal, 500 to 1000. He had had 30,000 to 50,000. He has very few troops but he is still able to operate very effectively in the field. He is still able to drum up support. He is very charismatic, so he is able to go into towns and give speeches and rally people and get recruits. He is still very effective at doing that. He is still really able to drum up support, even though he does have to go into towns sometimes and impress people at this time, which he had never had do that before. So he actually takes people into service forcefully, also, to fill out his ranks. But it is really remarkable how he remained popular and how he remained such a polarizing figure, but a figure who engenders so much support and admiration among many people in chihuahua, even at a real nadir in his career and even at a time when, during much of the time during the expedition, he is injured. It was very possible he was going to die. He could have died from his injuries, but instead, he is able to really rebuild his army to a remarkable degree. Steve from the u. S. Army collection campaigns of world war i, the mexican expedition, 1916 to 1917. Julie prieto, who is a historian at the u. S. Army center for military history, thank you very much for being with us. Julie thank you. This is American History tv on cspan3 every weekend, featuring programs exploring our nations past. Sunday at 7 p. M. Eastern, an interview with korean war veteran alan clark, who shares his experience in korea with the marine corps between 195053, from the Korean War Legacy Foundation oral history collection. Here is a preview. Out, it was, as you probably know, it was just one road, a thin road, you could not pass most of the time. We just went down that road. That was the way out. Couldnt do that. We were ambushed several times. Ne was a major ambush my part of the convoy. They hit us. We did not know they were there. They were not firing. They hit us all at once. The jeep i was in, i was in the backseat at the time, the jeep was hit, the engine was stopped. It hit the gas tank. Punched in. I was sitting in the backseat. Butne in the jeep was hit we all jumped out, there was a low hill on the backside. They started coming over. Firefight. Retty good i have a rifle. Second or third round, it jammed. There i was in the middle of a firefight with a jammed rifle. I looked around. There was a marine who had been hit. He wasnt moving. I said something to him. He did not say anything. Some ammunition and continue to fight. 50100 men altogether in this one section, our sergeant said, who is in charge here . I said, i am a lieutenant. I dont know if there was anyone senior. Lieutenant, you are it, what we do . Watch the full interview with alan clark, 7 p. M. Eastern, 4 p. M. Pacific on American History tv. The president s. Public affairs. Kvailable now in paperbac and ebook, biographies of every president , organized by ranking from noted historians, best to worst, featuring perspectives into the lives of our chief executives and their leadership styles. Visit www. Cspan. Org thepresident s. Order your copy today wherever books and ebooks are sold. American history tv is on cspan3 every weekend, featuring archives on our website at www. Cspan. Org, you can watch archival films, college lectures, and discussions on the programs. Www. Cspan. Org history. Up next on the presidency, we hear about Richard Nixons reforms of native American Government policies that led to the restoration of indian lands and inaugurated a new era of selfgovernment. His administration is credited with being one of the most proindian of the 20th century. And that was a time of increasing indian activism, including the occupation of san franciscos Alcatraz Island by native americans. Declaring they were reclaiming their land. We will also hear about the native American College football coach who may have inspired the young Richard Nixons thinking on indian affairs. Featured speakers including former Administration Officials that helped craft and enact these new policies. This 2012 video was presented by the Richard Nixon foundation. President nixons administration is regarded as one of the most proindian of the 20th century and one that restored lands to tribes and ushered in a new era of selfgovernment. Native americans found a champion in president nixon. A stance that resulted from his personal history and his consultation with indian leaders who helped shape his view of indian affairs. This policy breakthrough tk