The U.S. Army had thousands of troops in Russia at the time of this film for several reasons - as part of an Allied force to fight against the Reds in the civil war, to protect military supplies headed for the eastern front, to help operate the Tran-Siberian Railway and to help evacuate the Czechoslovakian Army and transfer them to the Western Front. President Woodrow Wilson began sending troops there in 1918, but they were all withdrawn by 1920.