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On the other hand, now that Austria has fallen to pieces the German plans have been frustrated. The Germans will not only be unable to use the Austrian Slavs again as cannon-fodder, but even the economic exploitation of Central Europe will be barred to them.
You think I'll only be cannon-fodder for the Germans. You want to be nice, kind, sweet to me to send me away with better thoughts.... Isn't that what you think?" He was impatient, almost angry. His glance blazed at her.
The enlisted men were chiefly homeless wanderers. This "cannon-fodder" would go into battle without enthusiasm, would perform what was required of them like obedient machines.
Her face was pale. "Do you mean that we are going to get into this war?" "I think it very likely, my dear." "But if we do, Graham " "We might as well face it. Graham will probably want to go." "He'll do nothing of the sort," she said sharply. "He's all I have. All. Do you think I'm going to send him over there to be cannon-fodder? I won't let him go." She was trembling violently.
One or two such experiences will definitively settle the point as to the relative advantage of the offensive and the defensive. Soldiers will not submit themselves to re-trial on re-trial of a res judicata. Grant, dogged though he was, had to accept that lesson in the shambles of Cold Harbour. For the bravest sane man will rather live than die. No man burns to become cannon-fodder.
I had most of my clothes on now and felt more courageous. 'It is all a plot to get him into disgrace and draft him off to the front. Stumm did not storm as I expected, but smiled. 'That was always his destiny, he said, 'ever since I saw him. He was no use to us except as a man with a rifle. Cannon-fodder, nothing else.
And his hatred turned against Russia, the mysterious land of the endless plains with its inexhaustible supply of cannon-fodder. As long as Russia was ruled by Paul I, the half-witted son of Catherine the Great, Napoleon had known how to deal with the situation. He was a pious man who believed that he had been chosen by God to deliver the world from the Corsican curse.
Hannibal in his victories lost almost nobody but Gauls, his cannon-fodder, who fought with poor shields and without armor. Nearly always driven in, they fought, nevertheless, with a tenacity that they never showed under any other command. Thucydides characterizes the combat of the lightly armed, by saying: "As a rule, the lightly armed of both sides took to flight."
"Oh, if a man feels that he should," Tommy began. He seemed at a loss for words, and ended lamely: "There's plenty of cannon-fodder in the country without men of your caliber wasting themselves in the trenches. You haven't the military training nor the pull to get a commission." Thompson's lips opened to retort with a sentence he knew would sting like a whiplash. But he thought better of it.
Two of us decided that we were physical cowards, and would not under any circumstances enlist. The flower of Oxford was too valuable to be used as cannon-fodder. The days passed like weeks. Our minds were hot and confused. It seemed that England must come in. On the afternoon of the fourth of August I travelled up to London. At a certain club in St James's there was little hope.
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