February 19, 1921. Poland and France look forward and see war, the United States looks back and sees the military past.

 

The literary digest, February 19, 1921.  This issue had a timely new map of Poland, whose frontiers, on this day, the French promised to guaranty.

France and Poland entered into a defensive alliance guarantying French aid to Poland in the result of it being attacked.  The alliance was aimed principally at an anticipated attack by the Soviet Union at the time.

The text was remarkably short:

THE Polish Government and the French Government, both desirous of safeguarding, by the maintenance of the treaties which both have signed or which may in future be recognized by both parties, the peace of Europe, the security of their territories, and their common political and economic interests, have agreed as follows: 

1. In order to coordinate their endeavours towards peace the two Governments undertake to consult each other on all questions of foreign policy which concern both States, so far as those questions affect the settlement of international relations in the spirit of the treaties and in accordance with the Covenant of the League of Nations. 

2. In view of the fact that economic restoration is the essential preliminary condition for the re-establishment of international order and peace in Europe, the two Governments shall come to an understanding in this regard with a view to concerted action and mutual support. 

They will endeavour to develop their economic relations, and for this purpose will conclude special agreements and a commercial treaty. 

3. If, notwithstanding the sincerely peaceful views and intentions of the two contracting States, either or both of them should be attacked without giving provocation, the two Governments shall take concerted measures for the defence of their territory and the protection of their legitimate interests within the limits specified in the preamble. 

4. The two Governments undertake to consult each other before concluding new agreements which will affect their policy in Central and Eastern Europe. 

5. The present agreement shall not come into force until the commercial agreements now in course of negotiation have been signed. Paris, February 19, 1921. 

(Signed) A. BRIAND. (Signed) E. SAPIEHA.

Poland had only lately fought the Read Army, and itself, to exhaustion.  In retrospect the Russo Polish War is normally regarded as an outright act of Soviet aggression, but a more honest assessment of it would have to acknowledge that not only was that a major feature of it, but that the Poles were pretty aggressively attempting to expand their vague borders as much as possible.  Poland, like many colonies, had never really had firm borders before and its population phased into neighboring regions, sometimes creating areas of mixed Polish and non Polish ethnicity, and sometimes resulting in distinctions that were based on dialects and religious confession.  Poland worked, right up to the end of the Russo Polish War, to expand its borders at its smaller neighbors expense.  None the less, its fight against the Red Army was heroic.

Following the war the Poles legitimately feared the Soviets attacking them again at any moment.  They feared the Germans from the onset as well, but less so as Germany was such a mess at the time and the size of its military was initially restricted by the Versailles Treaty.  Interestingly, the Soviets feared Poland and constantly imagined that the Poles were on the verge of attacking them, probably in concert with other powers such as France.

In the U.S. Army, Col. William C. Rivers was photographed.

He's rise to the rank of Major General.  I don't know who he was, but the remarkable thing is that he continued to be promoted, and significantly, post World War One.

Interestingly, he also bore a remarkable resemblance, at this point, to George S. Patton.

The U.S. Army by this point in the 1920s was entering the long post war period of doldrums.  By 1921 the war was still a near thing, but the post war was a nearer thing.  Congress had voted to scale the size of the Army way back.  The United States had excited the reparations commission created by the Versailles Treaty.  Promotions breveted during the Great War were also being scaled back. The acquisition of new equipment, including new technologies, was being much slowed.  The service may have only lately sponsored a transcontinental motor convoy, and a transcontinental air race, but those things were fading rapidly into the past.

Coming up, the Army would be smaller in every way, including in terms of career advancement.  Soldiers who only lately had fought in the great war, were training once again in ways that looked back rather than forward, although the slow introduction of new equipment didn't completely stop.  For officers, the career resembled what it had been prior to World War One, with prestige within the service, disdain from outside of it, parades and polo matches, and in more than one instance, quite a lot of alcohol.