Lions Led By Donkeys Podcast - Episode 164 - The Pancho Villa Expedition Part 2: No Nicknames Given

Episode Date: July 12, 2021

The conclusion to our *duology* The US invades Mexico, gets lost, commits crimes against humanity, goes home. Support the show: https://www.patreon.com/lionsledbydonkeys

Hey everybody, Joe here from the Lions Led by Donkeys podcast. If you enjoy what we do here on the show and you think it's worth your hard-earned money, you can support the show via Patreon. Just a $1 donation gets you access to bonus episodes, our Discord, and regular episodes before everybody else. If you donate at an elevated level, you get even more bonus content. A digital copy of my book, The Hooligans of Kandahar, and a sticker from our Teespring store. Our show will always be ad-free and is totally supporter-driven. We use that money to pay our bills, buy research materials that make this show possible, and support charities

like the Kurdish Red Crescent, the Flint Water Fund, and the Halo Trust. Consider joining the Legion of the Old Crow today. And now, back to the show. Hello, and welcome to yet another episode of Lions Led by Donkeys podcast. I am Joe, and with me to complete the series is Liam. Hello, Liam. Is it a series of its two parts? It's a duology. This is just a shitty sequel. Yeah, it's ever as good as the original duology there you go now oh lower your expectations folks hunger has set in i'm actually i skipped lunch now if you are listening to this where we

left off last week is that uh the u.s is getting ready to invade mexico if you're liam we left off last week is that the US is getting ready to invade Mexico if you're Liam we left off about five minutes ago I've been trapped in this room for two hours hey guys so when we left you last week Pancho Villa and his boys raided across the US Mexico border directly into the path of a shoeless man

manning a machine gun achieving virtually nothing and nearly melting the barrel. I almost killed so many of you I destroyed my gun. They achieved virtually nothing but pissing off the U.S. government that had already showed itself very comfortable with invading Mexico

from time to time. Now, commander of the Southern Department, which I guess is what it was called back then, General Frederick Frunston, telephoned the War Department the day after the Villa raid, saying, quote, I urgently recommend that American troops be given authority to pursue into Mexican territory hostile Mexican bandits who raid American territory. So long as the border is a shelter for them, they will continue to harass our ranches and towns to our chagrin. I guess he's not one for for rough language.

I guess he's not one for rough language. Now, Frunston is a weird guy who, like a lot of American generals of the day, their career was something of a Forrest Gump journey across the world in the age of early American imperialism. This brought him to the Philippines, where he was awarded the Medal of Honor. And before that, he fought in Cuba with Cuban revolutionaries against the Spanish also at one point in 1906 during the 1906 earthquake he was in command of a base called

the Presidium in California and he had declared martial law despite the fact he was not allowed to do that yeah oh sick during this time in martial law he ordered looters to be shot on sight, which ended with armed soldiers and civilians wildly opening fire on numerous innocent bystanders and also maybe some looters. Yeah, he's kind of a bastard. That's superb.

Gentlemen, I've come up with a way to stop disorder in the wake of the earthquake. We will simply do the purge. So front sin is a real bastard. He figured as commander of the Southern department and the one who responded to the mess, he would be given command of any invasion of Mexico, which the war secretary, which is what the department of defense was called back then.

And the president had already kind of sort of signed up for, but he wasn't to front. Stan's actual surprise. It was John blackjack Pershing, uh, who would be given command, which of course he'd be mostly known for to be the future commander of the American expeditionary force in a world war one.

Uh, and he was going to be the one given command the American Expeditionary Force in World War I. And he was going to be the one given command to pursue Villa into Mexico. Also, I was never... So, I'm 100% guilty here. I actually never knew where his nickname came

from before. Were you aware of where his nickname came from before? Nope. Okay. So, he was given that nickname because at one point he commanded an all-black cavalry unit out west that was it that was it okay okay so they called it wasn't black jack it was black jack like jack who was who works with black people. Yeah. Suddenly, I'm not comfortable ever calling him by his nickname ever again. John Pershing. John Pershing.

General Pershing. Yes. Now, Frunston would remain in command of the Southern Department, while Pershing, who doesn't have a nickname, would be in charge of the Expeditionary Force, meaning he was technically his subordinate. But Frunston wanted to go do war stuff with his friends, and this meant that he fucking hated Pershing and was a conniving dickhead

to him the entire time. So we know now that the two commanders of the expeditionary force are something of catty bitches to one another. Let's talk about the army that they were going to use for this expedition. Now, like we pointed out the last episode, the majority of the soldiers being massed at the border

were National Guardsmen. Much like during, if you remember all the way back during our Philippine War series, the U.S. still did not have much of a standing regular army. Like we talked about the last episode,

early American history was kind of like really hated a large standing military, something we have totally discarded yeah like the idea was

that the US Army would be the federalized military while the real power lay in the militias or the National Guard which are modern militias now not your country uncle with an AR. Instead, the regular army was kept very small, only big enough really to be deployed to crush

native people whenever any of them dared to deserve to want equal rights. For instance, when the government deployed 14,000 federal troops south, it accounted for almost the entire army. So when something like this happened, they would have to call up huge numbers of National Guard. By the end of the expedition, every single state other than Nevada, weirdly enough, would send the National Guard south. And it's because they didn't have one yet. Whatever. Today, the National Guard

soldiers go through the exact same training as regular soldiers do like when you go to basic training there'll be people in your class who are National Guardsmen when you go like when I went to tank school a large portion of my class is National Guardsmen there's really no functional difference

though of course regular army soldiers will bitch and complain about they're just so much better and they're not. Back then, it was much, much different. Guardsmen would be trained in their home state by their own trainers. Hypothetically, basic training was

the same. And it really was in most places as training in the army back then was mostly just like how to march with a little bit of marksmanship thrown in also many states found that the amount of men they had in paper was not actually accurate for the amount of men that were in

the National Guard for example in New York guardsmen wouldn't have to take a physical exam to determine if they were fit for service until they were called up that meant you know oh have to take a physical exam to determine if they were fit for service until they were called up. That meant, you know,

oh yeah, the New York National Guard has 5,000 people in it. Oh fuck, it's actually 20. That meant that a lot of these dudes all showed up and able to run a lap around the building or missing fingers or whatever. And I'm not pulling this out of my ass. This is from the actual National Guard historian website.

Quote, across the nation, the sheer number of soldiers who had to be examined created a problem. Equally troublesome, the number of prospective soldiers had failed a rudimentary physical were staggering. The reasons were varied, including venereal disease, disease defective vision hernias bad teeth obesity overall poor physique underweight or overweight amputations or deformities like you could just like go sign up like a list like yeah i'm totally in the guard uh you don't have to do anything though i'm not going to make you do a physical i see you're missing an arm that won't become a problem until later it's weight savings man don't shame me some places the guard. You don't have to do anything, though. I'm not going to make you do a physical. I see you're missing an arm. That won't become a problem until later. It's Wayne Savings, man. Don't shame me.

In some places, the guard had to reject a full quarter of the people they actually had on their rolls. Again, this is from the National Guard website. When the final mobilization records were tallied, the state that had the lowest rate of rejections was Colorado with 10%,

while Ohio topped the list with 25. See? Fuck you, Ohio. Not a real state, notably. Arkansas, similar rejection of 870 out of 2,000 that were examined at the Little Rock mobilization site proved that Ohio was not alone in their shortcomings. For the 14 Midwest states that made up the Army Central Department, the average number of rejections

is over 15%. The New York Adjutant General, General John O'Reilly, would later point out that the basic fallacy in the system, physical exams should take place before an enlistee joins the unit, not while getting ready to deploy.

No shit. Thanks, dude. This is like not having a job interview until you go to your first day at the job. What do you mean you're not a doctor? You said you were a doctor. Well, sure. I lied. You said you're an engineer.

Well, I mean, I'm sure I'm still good enough to build a condo in Miami. Oh, no. Now, when they finally did get mustered and sent off to camps to catch up on training, it was further discovered that the War Department did not plan ahead at all. If you were going to pick like three things for these guardsmen to go train, what do you think they would need? Yes.

What would be number two? Yes. What about number three? What if I told you I didn't have any of those? Oh, that's not very good. This whole company is not very good at their jobs.

There wasn't enough guns, water, boots, food, or even basic uniforms for the camps at first. Many only trained by marching around a stick instead of guns before being sent uniforms for the camps at first. Many only trained by marching around a stick instead of guns before being sent south, hypothetically, to war.

This is my rifle. This is my stick. Go cut a switch so you can pretend to be a soldier. This is one of the reasons why, despite there being around 140,000 guardsmen being called up, only a handful of regiments would actually

be sent over the border into Mexico, with the main force being the federalized army being somewhat better trained and organized. Now, if you look... I feel like someone's doing a lot of work there. They at least had boots on them, I guess.

And the National Guard historian would argue that no National Guard units crossed the border of New Mexico. There is enough evidence to prove that is not entirely correct. But the vast, like, and it wasn't the Guard that came up with the idea that they're not going to go over the border. Like, the commanders

were like, holy shit, we can't use these guys. Right. Well, the Guard tripped of their own dick to mobilize a massive amount of people quicker than anyone had in 1916 had any business of doing in the u.s government uh the u.s also managed to pull off a lot of firsts uh that would end up being something of a practical practice for the upcoming world war that they would find themselves in this included using planes and truck convoys for the first time. Now remember, 1916.

Planes have been around for like 15 years. Pretty fucking new. America. Granted, it was 1916, so these planes and trucks sucked and broke down and fell out of the sky with alarming regularity. America.

Now, originally, one surprise party to this exposition was the Mexican government itself, led by Carranza. Well, I can agree. We can all probably agree that this was an invasion of Mexico at large. But it was done so with, at least at first, the consent of the Mexican government. And this is mostly because it was a way to avoid an all-out war with the U.S. Carranza originally refused

to allow U.S. soldiers across the border, pointing out that he too was at war with Villa and he would use his own military to track him down and bring him to justice. The U.S. refused this for two reasons. One, they did not trust Carranza and figured that he would take the side to protect Villa, despite the fact that the U.S.

is still supporting the government of Mexico and also because of optics. News of a raid on Columbus had spread rapidly across the U.S. And to be fair, a lot of the reporting done on the raid was blown wildly out of proportion to make it look 100 times worse than it actually was. Some good old yellow journalism. While it wasn't the first raid of the border into the US,

it was certainly the largest. American people and government wanted revenge. There was a whole lot less flair than getting that kind of allied government to do it for you. It is virtually the same reason why after 9-11, the Taliban government in Afghanistan is like, yeah, we'll give you Osama

bin Laden. You have to recognize us as the government in Afghanistan is like, yeah, we'll give you Osama bin Laden. Just like you have to recognize us as the government. And we were like, no, no, no. We're going to wage a pointless war instead. God damn you. We do not have to hand it to the Taliban. However, they gave us a way out. Now, you could also theorize that there was no functional way the Taliban could deliver Osama bin Laden to us, which, sure, fine. But the offer was on the table.

And that's the thing is like you want to look like you're doing something good, right? You are like, no, look, I like we as the government are doing something to protect you. Not like, yeah, they're going to go catch him for us. We'll be good. It's stupid. Thanks, the Taliban. our good friends the taliban friends of the pod the taliban cut that out so after a week of mild threats caranza caved allowing u.s forces into mexico as long as they did not leave the state of chihuahua

though caranza did manage to get one final fuck you before the operation began, refusing to allow the US access to the Mexican railways for resupply. This was done for no reason other than I hate you. Functionally, it did not matter. This forced the US to use horses

and the aforementioned shitty Dodge pickup trucks. I assume their quality has improved somewhat. I don't know. I'm not a truck guy. Another way the Mexican people, government, and rebels all work together to fuck with U.S. soldiers would be to constantly cut telegraph lines as they advance, which is kind of hilarious. so on March 15th 1916 the US army crossed the border into Mexico in three separate columns and quickly

learned that holy shit was the US military not ready to pull off something quite like this had a hell of a lot of time to get a head start and had no plans to sit and fight the entire bite of the US military with his handful of stolen guns that he had gotten a couple weeks ago.

Even if it was held together with horses, old-timey trucks, and dudes who trained with tree branches, it was still a much better fighting force than anything VIA could muster. And then he got the fuck out of the way, forcing the US to go on one hell of a hike and immediately running out of their own supply lines.

This is something that's like common with a lot of invading forces is that most commanding generals are combat soldiers once upon a time like they come from cavalry or infantry or tanks or whatever like none of these guys are logistics generals so they're like no we're gonna deploy these soldiers to go fight and meanwhile all the people who are desperately trying to bring you food and ammo can't keep up with you. Like, it's like a tale as old as Napoleon did it. Fucking Hitler did it. Everybody does it eventually.

You know who didn't do it? Nah, nah. General Sherman, man. If we don't have supply lines, they don't have supply lines. That is one way to do it, yeah. Within a short amount of time, Pershing was over 400 miles into mexico which doesn't seem like it's that long but remember it's 1916 and most of these guys have no idea what they're doing it was also around this time that he learned unfortunately that the

u.s military in its totality did not have enough trucks or pack animals to supply the expedition this forced the secretary of War to pull nearly a half a million dollars out of somewhere nobody's entirely sure where to buy literally any truck or horse he could find. Yeah, now that's like 12 million dollars in today dollars, which

like if the military today was attempting to spend that much money, they would get nothing for it because it's only 12 million dollars. But back then, there was a lot of fucking money for the Secretary of War to be throwing around. One half of one and four. Through the requisition process, we got you this magazine spring.

Now, on the flip side, the acquisition of these pack animals and trucks did not go great because, say, if you happen to have a whole bunch of busted ass trucks that barely ran half dead pack animals and suddenly the government's like

we will pay you literally any amount of money if you give us your trucks what are you going to do with those trucks you're going to you're going to pawn them off on the government and that's exactly what happened oh yeah they could dictate the prices for their worst pack animals and trucks and just make the government

pay them obscene amounts of money and admittedly the government was not in a place to refuse it's it's not like trucks were everywhere in 1916 like there's only so many right so when they finally got the trucks they needed so their soldiers could eat and shoot their guns maybe they realized that all the roads marked on their map either simply did not exist or were completely worthless when it rained um furthermore a lot of these trucks just could not handle rough terrain uh and they broke down constantly when they had to drive off of what we would consider a road uh now this breakdown forced engineers to build roads for the army to march on, slowing the entire process down. Or even funnier,

sometimes that the trucks were so incredibly unreliable, they had to hook them up to pack animals and then pull them. Like this Dodge truck has literally two horsepower. Way to go team. It's the first Ram. This is called efficiency. I believe that's how Dodge Rams are still marketed. Pershing also found the vaunted planes that were going to act as,

as recon element. We're pretty much suicidally useless. Now the, they were using biplanes and these are early American biplanes. Now there, there'd be a lot of evolution and flight technology as World War one more on because people

learned you could drop bombs from them and shit we're not using those planes those aren't the planes we're using mostly the Battle of Blair Mountain to test out bombing and like any at this point these are unarmed planes but they also were planes who could barely fly.

They're biplanes made of mostly canvas and wood. And they couldn't do their job because they didn't have enough power to overcome the winds that came off of the mountains of northern Chihuahua. So a lot of these guys are trying to get over the mountains and then crashing and dying. Or just having to turn around, which is kind of hilarious. No, we got these new revolutionary technologies for you. It's called a plane. It's going to be able to recon the Pontrovia, and he's not going to be able to do anything about it.

Okay, okay. Never mind, you can't use any of the planes. We hit a surprise snag, this being a terrain feature that's been here for millions of years. That's crazy how that works out. All of these things aside, the U.S. assumed they'd still be able to find Villa. After all, not only had he

been raiding across the border for supplies as his power dwindled, he had been raiding Mexican towns and villages, turning some amount of the population against them. So, when American forces rolled into these villages, assuming that the townspeople would help them they were shocked to find out that they were very unpopular and they would not tell them shit

now if you're listening those fuckers yeah like of course this is what fucking happened it's the exact same reason that like all of those uh the previous revolutionary groups worked with caranza because they hated huerta not because they liked each other these villagers probably do hate via but they also hate americans way more who invaded their country again the theory of fuck that guy now we are that guy that's all it is look at like any popular resistance movement as soon as the unifying enemy leaves. Afghanistan, either with

the Soviets or the British, the Soviets, or us in a few years. What we consider a unified is going to crumble and start fighting each other because they don't have anything to unify around anymore. Now we're helping unify Mexico by making everybody hate us.

But after two weeks of running around in circles, not finding shit, and only getting the occasional skirmish with Villa's forces, elements of the 7th Cavalry finally ran into a large force of Villa's men at the town of Guerrero. Unfortunately for the men of the 7th,

this is not the set piece battle they had hoped for. Because that's like when the things they continually, like, is the through line for this entire expedition. At no point does Via like, this is where we're going to sit and defend and fight these guys. He's a raider. Why would he do that?

Exactly. And that's like the thing that Pershing's like, we'll corner him eventually and he'll have to fight us. Like, no, the fuck you won't. No, it doesn't.

It's a much better option to die running. Now the men had just undergone a 55 mile March to the Sierra Madre mountains in just 17 hours. Now, admittedly, this is on horseback, but that does mean that their horses are fucking exhausted. They might not be, but they're a cavalry unit, which is more important here but that does mean that their horses are fucking exhausted they might not be but they're a cavalry

unit which is more important here and just before that they had marched 400 miles in 14 days so they're not exactly uh exactly i've not like i i have ridden a horse on like i think two occasions incredibly uncomfortable

uh i can't imagine riding that for 400 fucking miles. These guys had burned through much of their supplies of food and water in order to get to the town where they heard Villa's men were held up when they finally got there and found it to be well defended and surrounded by a thick

wall that would stop gunfire. It also didn't help with their civilian guy, a white guy who swore up and down that he knew the area like the back of his hand got lost continuously along the way, prolonging the entire march, which is just lovely. I mean, that's fantastic. Shout out to that guy for bilking the government out of, I assume, as a decent sized paycheck. I'm going to start a company called Blackwater. I'm going to go join the Dakota National Guard.

Soldiers of the 7th were ordered to surround the town, which was made impossible because it had mountains on two sides of it. Who would have thought? Which V is men, unlike the guy they hired, really did know the back of their hand and used the terrain for cover.

There was no real unifying force amongst V's men other than not wanting to stick around and fight one group took off running engaged in a running horseback gun battle like some baller ass shit out of a cowboy movie with the americans as they went though yeah like i am not a great marksman however i can assure you i'd be a terrible marksman on horseback and it really seems like most of these guys were too, because this is not the first running gun battle, or this is not going to be the last running gun battle on horseback

we talk about in this episode. And the casualties are very, very low. It's because nobody could aim. You're just bouncing around the back of a wild animal, firing a rifle wildly over its head. Nobody's hitting fucking anything. That's the reason they're head. Nobody's hitting fucking anything. That's right.

Now, another group of Vias men within Guerrero simply walked out of the town. Now, their whole master plan was, we'll just pretend to be the Mexican National Army. I bet these fucking gringos are too stupid to tell the difference. They were right. They just walked out and pretended to be

karanza's soldiers who remember supposedly technically allies of the u.s government and they well that's we got bamboozled sir ah yeah nevertheless we will try you want to guess how exactly they tricked the americans they just walked out and said oh we killed them all they simply picked up a mexican flag and walked out with it. Oh, my God. And the Americans are like, ah, checks out. Good enough. Come on by, boys.

Now, in the running battle, one of Via's close friends was killed, and people believe they actually may have wounded Via, but that was just a rumor. There's actually no evidence that Via was even in Guerrero at the time. And even though the U.S. considers this the most successful battle of the entire exposition there's no evidence that via was actually there at all and actually the reason why that the the the fleeing soldiers got away is because the the cavalry troopers horses were so tired from the march they couldn't keep up otherwise they would have definitely seen

that via wasn't there uh but yeah like i said this event is considered the most successful battle of the expedition so much so that the man in charge of it colonel george dodd was promoted to brigadier general and became a national hero i assume the bar is very low back then um well i mean the bar is low now uh dodd himself must not have been very proud of all of this because he retired that same month just 23 days later now despite this ongoing clusterfuck pershing no uh nickname given insisted things were going fine and morale was just as good as the day the exposition the expedition. And then the Battle of Paral happened. On April

13th, a force around 150 cavalry soldiers under the command of Frank Tompkins walked into the town of Paral. The town was thought to be a resting spot, and they had been told along the way by members of the National Army I assume maybe also Villa's guys just holding a flag

that they would be greeted by Mexican soldiers when they got there but when they got to the town they were not welcomed instead a Mexican general Ismael Lozano told Tompkins that him and his men should fuck off or there would be problems Thompson knowing the delicate diplomacy

at play realized that he and his men should leave before something popped off between him and the possible elements of the National Army. The tired soldiers got back on their horses and began to leave the town. While they were about a half mile away,

Tompkins heard someone shout from back in the city, Viva Via! And then a force of 500 National Army Cavalry soldiers charged out at them guns drawn oh boy now tompkins knew that if he stood and fought his very outnumbered unit would be overwhelmed so instead they fought a delaying fighting withdrawal for eight miles on horseback until they got back to the fortified american town of santa de cruz de vegas i'm sure

sorry guys in the running battle both sides took very few casualties but the entire expedition was changed because of it american forces stuck by the strict rules put in place by carranza while they were over 500 miles from the border they were still in Chihuahua State like the state that they were told by Carranza that they had to stay there and there is no evidence that Carranza ordered General Lozano

to attack the Americans but after it happened he just rolled with it and refused to apologize for the actions of his soldiers which you know fair enough whatever yeah well that's... Hey, man. Sometimes you just gotta own it. They're gonna do what they're gonna do,

and I'm gonna open this beer. Good luck to you. President Carranza, your general attacked us. Yeah, so what? I thought... Why don't you tell him to suck his dick and be hateful? I thought you said you wouldn't. Yeah, I did.

And it happened anyway. Uh-huh. You going somewhere with this? See, my secret is I can't order my generals not to attack you because I don't control them, sir. What was really happening was the American presence in the country had temporarily ended the war between Via and Carranza. And many soldiers were simply joining Via to get a crack at the U.S. as they went by.

It's crazy how that would happen. There's even parts that Lozano could have joined Via or also the so-called National Army soldiers were like, oh, we're with Via for now. And then like, oh, we're with the National Army when the Americans leave. like they didn't care they didn't give a shit about via like it was just is the goddamn principle of the matter right right karan's is either unwilling or unable to

stop them from doing it and many of his generals were more than willing to play sides and i'm sure on karan's side it was both it doesn't have to be one or the other he was both unwilling and unable as I mean at any point have he pissed off his generals who wanted to fight the Americans I mean they just turned on him he knows how he came to power like everybody

already did this once I shouldn't make them not hate me which is kind of like ironic as the concept of fighting for via was more than an idea at this point um like because remember via and his forces were rendered militarily useless right uh there's there's no via army at this point. Like the concept of like fighting for Pancho Via or Viva Via is more of a vibe. It just means fuck the Americans, which I, you know, fine. Fair.

Cool. We deserve it. After running from the US, it caused Via's men to desert him. And the Battle of Guerrero smashed when their last large unit still in the field. Via really wasn't a threat to anyone at this point he was just managing to escape the americans almost certainly with the help of the caran's administration and the mexican military at several different layers uh and and levels but like the main thing that he was doing was just not getting caught which sure you know whatever george washington was brilliant at retreating and he's the father of the country you don't actually have to win battles to win a war i mean ask the taliban right what is even worse

is that before the battle of peral it was almost certain the expedition was going to wrap up the military in the u. US government was coming to the conclusion that it actually looked pretty bad for them to be chasing a single dude throughout Mexico. And only four days before the Battle of Peral, the Secretary of War said that Pershing had accomplished everything he was going to

and the soldiers should turn around and come back, which is like taking your ball and going home with the military. They were realistic like we're never going to fucking capture this guy. Right. But after Paral, Pershing was fucking pissed.

He demanded he be allowed to shift the expedition from what it was into an actual invasion of Mexico at large, taking the entire state and entire capital of that state in Chihuahua.

This is nuts, and thankfully, this was refused. So you're probably wondering what made Mexico and the U.S. back down from almost certain all-out war at this point. Because at this point, the same excuse can't be used as Veracruz, right? Like, you're already committed.

Well, neither side really could wage a full-on war if they wanted to the US figured if they were if they wanted to start the second American Mexican American war for real they would need up to another hundred thousand troops remember they already have and they've already gotten rid of about a quarter of the

other guys that wanted to sign up. They probably have to start a draft. Right. Which they just didn't have another 100,000 soldiers. Remember, they already have 140,000 at the border. And even if they did start a draft, they did not have the means to arm, equip, or train these guys. But Wilson also couldn't order a withdrawal. It would make his

administration look weak, and it was during, what else, an election cycle. Yeah. Of course, why'd I fucking ask? Of course this is all very stupid, but the votes are, uh, yes. Of course. So instead, the US advance

into Mexico simply stopped. and instead they pulled back closer to the border make and made like this kind of weird sort of not sort of is occupation force without any real mission or just sort of hung out or yeah i mean some missions were still carried out like there was raids uh like for one instance a young lieutenant you may have heard of George Patton carried out the first motorized assault yes I've heard of noted bastard lieutenant

future general that's a real asshole as it turned out critical support to the scooter that killed him now maybe it was a car accident I remember I think it was a motorcycle or a scooter but um anyway he carried out the first motorized assault in u.s military history which i only bring this up because it amounted to being a drive-by uh you wouldn't say so this uh it was a possible via strong point and he was sitting inside of a dodge touring car

during a mission and uh it started as a quest to go buy corn and just happened to let off with a gat yeah like he ended up getting in a gunfight with a revolver out the door of his fucking touring car which gave them the show yeah he also ran them over and dangle them over a fucking balcony over the ice ice baby noted CEO of death row records George

S Patton I hope that's a photoshop that someone makes it absolutely nobody's gonna understand outside the listeners of the show and honestly fuck Patton it's a photoshop that someone makes it absolutely nobody's gonna understand outside the listeners of the show um and honestly fuck Patton obviously we don't like him but that also is

the most Patton thing I've ever heard other than him yeah that's pretty far up there like smacking soldiers around for having PTSD like I'm gonna go out and get corn oh surprise drive-by occurs also making history little Patton. Lil Pat.

But in general, for the most part, soldiers in this occupation didn't really do anything. They had nothing to do. Just vibes, bro. Just vibes, bro. And there's nowhere to go.

So soldiers sat around gambling and drinking away their paychecks lives bro just vibes bro and in like there's nowhere to go um so like soldiers sat around gambling and drinking away their paychecks because they had nowhere else to spend it like good for them at this point casualties and the expedition came mostly from accidents and it's probably from being

drunk and fighting each other over poker and shit now there was one main threat to soldiers, and that is the specter of wandering off the base to find a hooker and catching the clap. Now, you think I might...

Some people are probably thinking we're joking here, but according to General Pershing, this was in fact true. So, rather than telling you what the system is that he instituted, I'm simply going to read off directly from the National Guard archives here. I'm going to let you put a title on it.

Okay. And it gets dark. Now, again, this is directly from the National Guard archive. I did not editorialize anything here in case anybody thought I was trying to make things sound worse. But, quote, another feature of the camp at Colonia Dublon were the numerous Mexican prostitutes who followed the troops. To prevent men from leaving camp, Pershing had the prostitutes rounded up and placed under guard in a specially graded barbed wire stockade. Soldiers wishing to visit the stockade were required to show the guard on duty they had the necessary fee that was regulated by the provost marshal. After completing business with one of the visiting ladies, a soldier is required to take a prophylactic provided by the army.

The result was a strict sanitary measure that was one of the lowest venereal disease rates an army had ever known sex slaves they had sex slaves yeah that's what that is and congratulations everybody and in case you're wondering the provost marshal is in charge of the military police so this was a

a rape stockade guarded by cops uh-huh i hate this A rape stockade guarded by cops. Uh-huh. I hate this place. And if anybody says that, well, it's different, they're paying him. No. Fuck you.

Why were they in barbed wire? Why were they rounded up? Like, that's what this is. Like slaves run off. Yes. I'm going to break into your house and steal your TV and leave you a crisp 20 at the counter. Are we good? I think not.

That's so fucked up. So, U.S. Army has some explaining to do on their Mexican sex slaves. Gotta go ahead and assume they're just... Who gives a shit? Also, honestly, I'm not shocked that this happened. You've listened to this show enough before you became a host on it. I've been doing 160 fucking episodes at this point.

This part doesn't shock me. What does shock me is that this was touted as a good measure on the National Guard's website. This is one of those things that you just bury. That doesn't even shock me. Just the dumbest people doing the dumbest shit. I should be shocked,

but I'm not. I'm just like, yeah. That seems like something they'd be like, yeah, we did it, guys. If I was the historian for the Army National Guard, like, guys, we can take that part out. We can put this down he's making us flex on this we could say regrettably

and then the same paragraph yes you don't have to be like this that's like the like the uh i don't know the u.s army air corps bragging about the or the the british air corps the royal air force whatever

bragging about the density of bombs on Dresden. You don't have to do that. Anyway, U.S. forces stationed at Colonia Dublon were meant to be something of a threat, showing Mexico what would happen if they didn't take their mission of catching VIA seriously. Remember, they went back to the um okay the government says they can capture via the government's right uh which of course

karanza did not care he didn't give a shit at this point he knew well the army is not coming back like they pulled back for a reason we literally literally shot at them and they, they, they shrunk at the challenge. So like, they're not, even if we fuck around, they're not going to come at us for, for not catching via. Right.

Right. Uh, skirmishes continued and soldiers on both sides and civilians for that matter, kept dying while achieving absolutely nothing. Uh, which I, I understand.

I, I, I just explained all of military history in that sentence but you know yep people die for no fucking reason it happens a lot don't worry about it yeah yep after numerous mostly pointless negotiations between the mexican and american governments the u.s finally withdrew on January of 1917. Both Pershing and Wilson publicly called the expedition a success. Well, whatever you want, I guess. In case you're keeping track, they did not achieve its one singular goal, which is catching Pancho Villa.

Neither did Carranza, for that matter. Pershing blamed Wilson for having too many restrictions on military operations. Does that sound familiar to anybody? Oh, God. I assume that that restriction is the president didn't let me just do whatever I wanted. I wanted to

do war crimes. I want a war. You have a war at home. A war at home um uh war home sucks mom will you get apple bees I mean honestly the expedition of Mexico is truly the apple bees of American wars I don't know how I'm gonna rank

the rest of them in comparison to fast casual restaurants but I'll work on that for the future we'll figure it out now I like it. What's kind of incredible is like in his private letters Pershing did

not blame Wilson. He blamed he said that quote we returned home like a whipped cur with its tails between its legs. So like he got beat but it didn't matter. Pershing no nickname given became a national figure. Frenston died of a heart attack

as soon as the expedition was over and that meant that Pershing would. What a bitch. Pershing pretty much rode clout to become the the AEF commander in World War I. Like there were significantly more accomplished generals in the US military at the time but everybody

knew who Pershing was. so like you got it sir look that was it and only a few months later uh the american expeditionary force was in france um i believe it was like april or june the same year it was only a couple months later and thankfully nothing bad ever happened in the u.s mexico border ever again a couple months later and thankfully nothing bad ever happened in the US Mexico border ever again nope nope nope and the episode for the L.S. so how

do you feel about the second Mexican American war that should be called that but isn't of course we just like did like I love the story of the dudes just like hanging out and gambling just vibes just vibes like honestly I love the story of the dudes just hanging out and gambling. Just vibes. Just vibes.

Honestly, the army fucking up and ending with soldiers not entirely sure why they're somewhere while also getting drunk and gambling pretty much covers my entire career. I don't know um it was interesting to me to see is how backwards the national guard system was right and then honestly it would have been very interesting to see how badly world war one would have gone if we had not done this first right like this is almost like a dry run for a lot of it and like right like a warm-up. Yeah. Like a tune-up, if you will. You got to have a warm-up neighboring war before you go overseas and do war. That's right.

And the National Guard historian admits that pretty much. Like, yeah, we learned how to mobilize people correctly and also not let a cousin with no knees enlist in the National Guard or whatever. So, Liam, we do a segment on this show called Questions from the Legion. If you would like to ask us a question from the Legion, donate to the show. Find me on Discord. Slide into my DMs on Twitter or Patreon, preferably Patreon.

And ask me a question that is not important and could be saved for a Q and a episode whenever we do it. Those again, and this one is topical. I believe, um, obviously both of us are sports fans. Um, what is making you mad about sports at this moment?

Uh, Jalen hurts. Isn't very good. Ben Simmons exists. Uh, the, the fucking Stanley cup final is lightning abs uh the phillies suck ass but uh i kemba walker broke my heart uh shit uh what did kemba walker

do he just got hurt like last year and then they had to trade him and it was just a bummer because he's my favorite player uh but uh yeah uh ben simmons being on a max contract and just refusing to shoot the fucking basketball is pretty far up there at the moment i saw a clip of him like literally sitting at a whole play and not like doing anything and it was pretty incredible he just does that he just does that now he like he's so afraid to like take criticism or miss a free throw that he's just like i just won't play that solid i mean you can't have bad if you simply never play that's true but like you're on a fucking max like get out there and miss like you know i i would rather you like visibly like suck and at least start trying than like whatever the fuck this shit is it's unwatchable um i have to second

the stanley cup finals gripe mostly and i understand that due to covid and their refusal to not do sports during a time of pandemic meant they had to change how the playoff format was effectively guaranteeing a Canadian team would go to the Stanley cup finals because that's the only way any of those mismanaged teams are ever going to make it that far as if it's gifted to them. Right. The worst one made it meaning it's going to be a fucking sweep for the bolts. Yeah,

I, I know. And I just like their shit with the salary cap and like all that other dumb bullshit it's just like i'm so fucking tired of steven stamkos existing yeah and what sucks i'm another gripe is just generally detroit sports in general currently um obviously the light jared golf bud the uh the uh former lightning general manager steve eiserman moved back to michigan and became general manager of the red wings and the only thing that that makes me mad right now is um

like steve eiserman never would have gone to tampa bay if ken holland uh the old general manager refused did not refuse to give up his spot right and you know all of like he steve eiserman didn't have a ton of draft picks to choose from when he was in tampa bay either he just is good at scouting right hiring good scouts and listening to them that's not that far out of the realm of belief that we like detroit gets a lot of the same players that the tampa bay lightning now have and turn them into a fucking dynasty and instead we, we're going to be last place for the next 10 years. But that's why I'm mad. Also, the Blackhawks covering up sexual assault in the NHL.

Hey, what's new? NHL shaking hands on that one. Anyway, welcome to the Lions Led by Hockey podcast. A podcast I wish I could make because I fucking love hockey. But Liam, plug your other show. Well, there's your problem.

It's a show about engineering disasters. Listen to it. It's good. And occasionally, they allow me to come on it to pimp my books. Oh yeah, we got to have you back on. Also, thank you for everybody donating to the show. Donate the $3 level and you get an entire new series called The History of Armenia once a month because I cannot possibly do another once a week show. Liam, thank you for joining me on your first series of two.

Your duology. The Liam duology. Thank you for having me on your first series of two, your duology, the Liam duology. Thank you for having me. This is now Liam's Led by Donkeys. Liam's Led by Donkeys. Until next time, everyone, don't do anything the National Guard did in the last two hours. Try not to invade

Mexico. Try not to invade Mexico. Later.