Bigger Army "Inevitable."

New York Times 100 years ago today, May 16, 1913:
French Premier's Declaration — Chamber Indorses the Policy.
   PARIS, May 15.— Premier Barthou declared in the Chamber to-day that the retention of this year's time-expired soldiers in the army was urgent and inevitable in consequence of the European situation.
    He made this statement in reply to questions by Deputies Durafour and Brizon, who asked him whether it was necessary to keep the men with the colors for another year. The Premier said the Government took the fullest responsibility for this action.
    The Premier's declaration was followed by an animated debate. Mr. Durafour alluded to what he termed the "audacity" of the Premier in using bellicose language in a speech at Caen two weeks ago, "at a moment when the peace of Europe was assured." The Government, without adequate cause, the speaker said, was depriving a quarter of a million young men of their liberty and was depriving France of a year of their more useful service in civil life.
    Edouard Lachaud, Radical-Republican, said there was no place to house the new recruits if the time-expired men were retained, and he asserted that the barracks were now breeding places for tuberculosis.
    The Chamber approved the Government's military policy by a vote of 315 to 241.