Lessons of the War

The moral of the present situation seems to me to be that we should scrutinise our political personages, noting which of them have betrayed their inability to see what was happening and to look ahead, bringing down their figures in our minds to their natural size, and exalting those who have shown themselves equal to their tasks. The man in the street might do well to consider whether the great departments of Government, such as the War Office and the Army, should for ever be entrusted to men who have not even a nodding acquaintance with the business which their departments have to transact, the business called War. Success in that as in other business depends on putting knowledge in power.

TWO VIEWS OR TRUE VIEWS?

November 15th, 1899

October 11th saw the opening of hostilities, and of the first chapter of the war, the conflict between Sir George White with sixteen thousand men and General Joubert with something like double that number. The first chapter had three sections: First, the unfortunate division of Sir George White's force and the isolation of and unsuccessful attack upon his right wing; secondly, the reunion of his wings at Ladysmith; thirdly, the concentration of the Boers against the force at Ladysmith and the surrounding or investment of Sir George White. This third section is not yet ended, but the gathering of the forces at Cape Town and at Port Natal points to its conclusion and to the opening of the second chapter. The arrival of the first portion of the transport flotilla is the only important change since last week.

I thought from the beginning that the division of Sir George White's force was strategically unsound, and the position of Ladysmith a bad one because it lent itself to investment. It is now known that the division of forces and the decision to hold Ladysmith, even until it should be turned and surrounded, was due not to strategical but to what are called political considerations. The Government of Natal thought that if the troops were withdrawn from Glencoe—Dundee, or the whole force collected, say at Colenso instead of Ladysmith, the appearance of retreat would have a bad effect on the natives, the Kaffirs, and perhaps the Dutch farmers. Accordingly, out of deference to the view of the local Government, the General consented to do his work in what he knew to be the wrong way. This is a perfect specimen of the way in which wars are "muddled"—I borrow the expression from Lord Rosebery—and it deserves thinking over.

No popular delusion is more extraordinary and none more widespread than the notion that there are two ways of looking at a war, one the military aspect and the other the governmental or civil aspect, that both are legitimate, and that, as the Government is above the general, in case of a clash the military view must fall into the background. This notion is quite wrong, and the more important the position of the men who have got it into their heads, the more harm it does. There is only one right way of looking at war, and that consists in seeing it as it is. If two men both take a true view of an operation of war, they will agree, whether they are both soldiers, both civilians, or one a soldier and the other a civilian. It does not matter what you call their view, but, as a soldier who knows his business ought to have true views about it, the proper name for the true view is the military view. If the civil view is a different one it must be wrong. In this case the belief that a retreat from a position to which troops had been sent would have a bad effect was no doubt founded on fact. But for that reason the troops ought not to have been sent there until it was ascertained that the forward move was consistent with the best plan of campaign. Some person other than the general charged with the defence of Natal had been arranging his troops for him without consulting him, and had done it badly. Then came the question of moving them back, and the probable "bad effect" was raised as a scarecrow. But the reply to that was that the bad effect of retreat is not half so bad as the bad effect of defeat, or of the embarrassments of a position which, being strategically wrong, may involve mishaps.

When a civil government moves troops in connection with war it ought to move them to the right places; that is according to sound strategy or sound military principles. In short, whoever deals in war ought to understand war. The reader may think that a commonplace, but in reality it is like too many commonplaces—a truth that very important people forget at critical moments. The first principle of action in war is to have two men to one at the decisive point. How comes it, then, that for six weeks Sir George White has to defend Natal with one against two? Evidently the first principle has been violated. It came about exactly in the same way as the putting one of Sir George White's brigades at Dundee. The Government managed it; it was a fragment of the civil view of war. How long, then, the reader may ask, should the civil view of war be allowed scope and when should the military view be called in? Let me be permitted to alter the labels and instead of "military view" to say "view based upon knowledge"; and instead of "civil view" to say, "view not based upon knowledge." I think that all dealings in war should be guided by the view based upon knowledge and that the other view should be for ever left out of account.

My unpopular belief that nobody should meddle with the management of a war unless he understands it is, I admit, most uncomfortable, for as a war is always managed by the Government I am obliged to think that every Government ought to understand war. But in this country the Government is entrusted to a Committee of Peers and Members of Parliament, none of whom is supposed to be able to take a military view of war. If my belief is right, a British Cabinet is very liable to take a civilian view, and the consequences might be awkward. In fact they are awkward, as the South African war up to date abundantly reveals.

The military view of war is that it consists in the employment of force to compel an adversary to do your will. The employment of force is required in the management of a Nation's affairs when the Nation has quite made up its mind to have something done which another Nation or State has made up its mind shall not be done. When there is this point-blank conflict of wills, and neither side can give way, there must be war; and the military view is that when you see war coming you should get your troops into their places, because the first moves are the most important, and a bad first move is very apt to lead to checkmate.

In the case of South Africa the true view was taken at the right time by Sir Alfred Milner. He was instructed that Great Britain would take up the Uitlander's cause, and sent to Bloemfontein to see whether President Kruger was prepared for an equitable settlement. He proposed such a settlement, and, as President Kruger declared the terms impossible, he made it plain that if there were no settlement on such lines as he had suggested, there must be war. That was the true view, and the moment when the conference was broken off was the moment for Great Britain to get her forces ready with all convenient speed. But Mr. Balfour on the day when he heard the news took a civilian view; instead of looking the war in the face he expressed the hope that President Kruger would change his mind. That hope the Government cherished, as we now know, until the end of the first week of September, when the Boer forces were so far on in their preparations that Natal had been begging for protection. The Government then sent ten thousand men, making the sixteen thousand of Sir George White. Yet the Government at that time had before it the military view that to compel the Boers to accept Great Britain's will seventy thousand men would be required. Evidently, then, the sending of the ten thousand arose not from the military view, but the civil view that war is a disagreeable business, and that it is to be hoped there will be none of it, or at any rate as little as possible.

The misfortunes in Natal will probably be repaired and the war in time brought to its conclusion—the submission of the Boers to Great Britain's will. But suppose the dispute had been with a great Power, and that in such a case the military view had been shut out from the day the negotiations began until the great Power was ready? The result must have been disaster and defeat on a great scale. Disaster and defeat on a great scale are as certain to come as the sun to rise to-morrow morning unless the Government arranges to take the military view of war into its midst. There will have to be a strategist in the Cabinet if the British Empire is to be maintained. This is another unpopular view and is hateful to all politicians, who declare that it is unconstitutional. But it does not, in fact, involve any constitutional change, far less change than has been made since 1895 at the instance of Mr. Balfour; and it would be better to alter a little the system of managing the Nation's affairs than to risk the overthrow of the Empire.

BULLER'S PROBLEM

November 22nd, 1899

The six weeks of anxious waiting are over, and to-day the second chapter of the war begins. On either side of the Boer States a division of Sir Redvers Buller's force is now in touch with the enemy, and at either point there may be a battle any day.

The small British forces sent out or organised on the spot before the declaration of war have kept the enemy's principal forces occupied until now, so that he has been unable to make any decisive use of the margin of superiority which he possessed over and above what was needed to keep the British detachments where they were. The resisting power of these detachments is, however, not inexhaustible; they have kept at bay for a considerable time forces much more numerous than themselves, and the first move required of the fresh British forces is to take the pressure off them and to combine with them. The centre of gravity is in Natal, for there is the principal Boer army, probably two-thirds of the whole Boer power, and there, too, a whole British division is invested. A palpable success here for either side must go far to decide the issue of the war.

General Joubert's force in Natal is so strong that while keeping his grip upon Ladysmith, where Sir George White has not less than ten thousand men, he has been able to move south with a considerable force, perhaps fifteen thousand men, to oppose Sir C.F. Clery's advance. Sir C.F. Clery has already at least seven, and possibly nine, strong battalions, to which within a day or two three more will be added, and perhaps as many as thirty-six guns, with parties of bluejackets and various Natal levies. His interest is to delay battle until all his force has come up. The advanced troops seem to be spread along the line from Mooi River to Estcourt, and the Boer forces are facing them on a long line to the east of the railway from a point beyond Estcourt to a point below Mooi River. The Boers are on the flank from which their attack would be most dangerous, and seem to aim at interposing between the parts of Sir C.F. Clery's force, and at a convergent attack in superior strength upon his advance guard at Estcourt.

I should have expected the advance parties of Sir C.F. Clery's force to have fallen back as the Boers approached. The attempt to keep up the connection between the parts of a concentrating force by means of the railway strikes me as very dangerous from the moment that the enemy is in the neighbourhood. The important thing for Sir C.F. Clery is not whether his battle takes place twenty miles nearer to Ladysmith or twenty miles farther away, but that it should be an unmistakable victory, so that after it the Boer force engaged should be unable to offer any further serious hindrance to his advance. To gain an end of this kind a general should not merely bring up all the troops from the rear, falling back for them if necessary, but should take care that none can be cut off by the enemy in his front. A decisive victory by Sir C.F. Clery or by Sir Redvers Duller, who may feel this action to be so important as to justify his presence, would leave no doubt as to the issue of the war. An indecisive battle would postpone indefinitely the relief of Ladysmith and leave the future of the campaign in suspense. Defeat would be disastrous, for it would probably involve the ultimate loss of Sir George White's force. For these reasons I regard the battle shortly to be fought in Natal as the first decisive action of the war, and am astonished that a larger proportion of Sir Redvers Buller's force has not been sent to take part in it.

The whole business of a commander-in-chief in war is to find out the decisive point and to have the bulk of his forces there in time. If he can do that on the half-dozen occasions which make the skeleton of a war he has fulfilled his mission. He never need do anything else, for all the rest can be done by his subordinates. Not every commander fulfils this simple task because not every one refuses to let himself be distracted. All sorts of calls are made upon him to which he finds it hard to be deaf; very often he is doubtful whether one or another subordinate is competent, and then he is tempted to do that subordinate's work for him. That is always a mistake because it means neglect of the commander's own work, which is more important.

The task, though it appears simple is by no means easy, as the present war and the present situation show. While the fate of the Empire hangs in the balance between Ladysmith and Pietermaritzburg, a good deal depends on the course of events between Kimberley and Queenstown. In the northern part of Cape Colony the Dutch inhabitants are naturally divided in their sympathies, and the loyally disposed have been sorely tried by the long weeks of waiting for some sign of Great Britain's power. None has yet been forthcoming. They know that Kimberley is besieged and that the British Government has done little for its defence. During the last week or two they have been threatened by the Free State Boers, and have seen Stormberg and other places evacuated by the British. At length the Free State Boers have come among them, marched into their towns, proclaimed the annexation of the country, and commandeered the citizens. If this goes on the Boer armies will soon be swelled to great dimensions by recruits from the British colony, a process which cannot go on much longer without shaking the faith of the whole Dutch population in the supremacy of Great Britain. Some manifestation of British strength, energy, and will is evidently urgently needed in this region. Moreover, Kimberley is hard beset, and its fall would seem to the whole countryside to be the visible sign of a British collapse. No wonder, then, that Sir Redvers Duller has sent Lord Methuen as soon as he could be ready to the relief of Kimberley. The column consists of the Brigade of Guards, the Ninth Brigade, made up of such battalions as were at hand to replace Hildyard's brigade (sent to Natal), of a naval detachment, a cavalry regiment, and two or three batteries, besides local levies. Kimberley is five or six days' march from Orange River, and at some point on the way the Boers will no doubt try to stop the advance. I feel confident that Lord Methuen, whom I know as an accomplished tactician, will so win his battle as not to need to do the same work twice over.

The advance of Lord Methuen's division renders imperative the protection of the long railway line from Cape Town to Orange River. This seems to be entrusted to General Forestier-Walker's forces, reduced to two battalions, and to General Wauchope's Highland brigade. One battalion only is with General Gatacre at Queenstown, and two battalions of General Lyttelton's brigade which have reached Cape Town are as yet unaccounted for in the telegrams.

How, then, if all his forces are thus employed could Sir Redvers Buller, by taking thought, have added anything to Sir C.F. Clery's force on the Mooi River? The answer is that a commander's decision must usually be a choice of risks. To have sent on to Natal a part of the troops now in Cape Colony would have been to have increased the danger of the Cape Dutch going over to the Boers. Which was the less of two possible evils—the spread of disaffection in the Cape Colony or the loss of Sir George White's force? No one at home can decide with confidence because the knowledge here available of the situation in either colony is very limited. Subject to this reserve, I should be disposed to think the danger in Natal the more serious, and the chance of losing Colonel Kekewich's force a mere trifle in comparison with the defeat of General Joubert, for the effect of Joubert's defeat would be felt on the Orange River, whereas the relief of Kimberley can hardly produce an appreciable effect on the situation in Natal.

The difficult problem of which General Buller is now giving his solution has been created for him by the Government, which from June to October was playing with a war which according to its own admissions it did not seriously mean. "Mistakes in the original assembling of armies can hardly be repaired during the whole course of the campaigns, but all arrangements of this sort can be considered long beforehand and—if the troops are ready for war and the transport service is organised—must lead to the result intended." So wrote Moltke in 1874 in one of the most famous passages ever published. If last spring the Government or even the Secretary of State for War alone had been in earnest, had been doing what plain duty required, the nature and conditions of the South African war would have been thought out, and the military judgment which was to conduct it would have been set to devise the proper opening. That would have consisted in landing simultaneously, thirty thousand men at Durban and forty thousand at the Cape. These forces would not have moved forward until they were complete and ready, and though the Boers might meantime have overrun their borders, the British advance when it came would have been continuous, irresistible, and decisive. Instead of that the Government gave the Boers notice in June that there might be war, so that the Boers had the whole summer to get ready.

When in September the Government began to think of action the only idea was defending Natal. But this defence was not thought of as part of a war. The idea never seems to have occurred to the Government that the need for defence in Natal could not arise except in case of war, and that then to defend Natal would be impracticable except by beating the Boer army. Accordingly, the handful of troops in Natal were posted without regard to the probable outlines of the war, and therefore, wrongly posted. The consequence was that when war came they could not be concentrated except at the cost of fighting and loss, and of a retreat which gave the enemy the belief that he had won a victory. Even then the point held—Ladysmith—was too far north and liable to be turned. All these mistakes, made before Sir George White arrived, were evident to that general when he first reached Ladysmith, but they could not then be remedied, and he had to do, and has done, the best he could in the circumstances. The fact of Sir George White's investment compels Sir Redvers Buller to begin his campaign with the effort to relieve him, and the fact that Kimberley is held by a weak force compels him to divide his force when his one desire certainly must have been to keep it united. In the expected battle at Mooi River Sir Redvers Buller will be trying to make up for the faulty arrangements of September. The desire to hold as much of the railway as possible—also due to the false position of Sir George White's force—has, perhaps, led General Hildyard to spread out his force over too long a line. But, in spite of the difficulties created by errors at the start, I am not without hopes that these remarks will soon be put out of date by a decisive British victory.

FIGHTING AGAINST ODDS

November 29th, 1899

Two factors in the present war were impressed upon my mind at the beginning: first, that the British Army was never in better condition as regards the zeal and skill of its officers, the training and discipline of the men, and the organisation of the field services; secondly, that the Government had deliberately handicapped that Army by giving the Boers many weeks' clear start in which to try with their whole forces to overwhelm the small British parties sent out at haphazard to delay them. The whole course of events up to now has been underlining these two judgments. The British troops gave proof of their qualities at Talana Hill, at Elandslaagte, and on the trying retreat from Dundee. There is no more difficult task in war than a frontal attack upon a position defended by the repeating rifle. Good judges have over and over again pronounced it impossible. But the British troops have done it again and again. General Hildyard's attack on Beacon Hill, an arduous action for a definite purpose which was effected—the re-opening of the railway from Estcourt towards the south—was a creditable achievement on the Natal side. On the Cape side Lord Methuen's advance from Orange River is an example of the greatest determination and energy coupled with caution on the part of the general, and of the most brilliant courage on the part of the troops. I thought it probable that so skilful a tactician as Lord Methuen would combine flank with frontal attacks. It seems that the conditions gave him little or no opportunity to do that, and he has had three times to assault and drive back a well-posted enemy. At Belmont, on the 23rd, and at Enslin, on the 25th, Lord Methuen had a numerical superiority large enough to justify an attack in which heavy loss was to be expected. The losses were not exceptionally great, and this fact proves that the British troops are of very much higher quality than their adversaries. At Modder River, on the 28th, the numbers were practically equal. The Boers were strongly entrenched and concealed, and could not be out-flanked. That they were driven back at all is as proud a record for our troops as any army could desire, for the attacking force ought to have been destroyed. The engagement may well have been "one of the hardest and most trying in the annals of the British Army," and if the victory is a glory to the soldiers, the resolve to attack in such conditions reveals in Lord Methuen the strength of character which is the finest quality of a commander.

If it is well that we at home should appreciate the splendid results of many years of good teaching given to the officers and men of the Army, results to be attributed in great part, though not exclusively, to the efforts of Lord Wolseley and his school, it is no less our duty to face squarely the fact that the Nation has not done its duty by this Army. The Nation in this sense means the people acting through the Government. To see how the Government has treated the Army we have only to survey the situation in South Africa. Fifty thousand men were ordered out on October 7th,—an Army Corps, a cavalry division and troops for the line of communications. The design was that, with the communications covered by the special troops sent for that duty, the Army Corps and the cavalry division, making together a body of forty thousand men, should cross the Orange River and sweep through the Free State towards Pretoria, while Natal was protected by a special force there posted.

But long before the Army Corps was complete this plan had been torn to pieces by the Boers. Sir George White's force, being hardly more than a third the strength of the army with which the Boers invaded Natal, could not stop the invasion, though it could hold out when surrounded and invested.

Accordingly the first task of Sir Redvers Buller was to stem the flood of Boer invasion in. Natal and to relieve Sir George White. For this purpose he is none too strong with three out of the six infantry brigades that make up the Army Corps. The remaining three brigades could not carry out the original programme of sweeping through the Free State, and meantime the Boers have overrun the great district between Colesberg and Barkly East, between the Orange River and the Stormberg range. General Gatacre with a weak brigade at Queenstown is watching this invasion which as yet he seems hardly strong enough to repel. The rest of the troops are required in the protection of the railways, of the depôt of stores at De Aar, and the bridge at Orange River. But Kimberley was invested and Mafeking in danger, and the effect of the fall of either of them upon the Cape Dutch might be serious. Something must be done. Accordingly Lord Methuen with two brigades set out towards Kimberley. His task is both difficult and dangerous; he has not merely to break the Boer resistance by sheer hard fighting, but to run the risk that Boer forces from other quarters, perhaps from the army invading Cape Colony, may be brought up in his rear, and that he may in this way be turned, enveloped, and invested. The scattering of forces is due to the initial error of sending too small a force to Natal, and of making no provision for its reinforcement until after a six weeks' interval. The consequence is that instead of our generals being able to attack the Boers with the advantage of superior numbers, with the concomitant power of combining flank and frontal attacks, and with the possibility of thus making their victories decisive by enveloping tactics or by effective pursuit, the British Army has to make attack after attack against prepared fronts, which though they prove its valour can lead to no decisive results, except at the cost of quite disproportionate losses.

It is possible, and indeed we all hope that the Boer forces, at first under-estimated, may now be over-estimated, and that Sir Kedvers Buller, whose advance is probably now beginning, will not have to deal with superior numbers. In that case his blows will shatter the Boer army in Natal, so that by the time he has joined hands with Sir George White the enemy will feel himself overmastered, will lose the initiative, and begin to shrink from the British attacks. That state of things in Natal would lighten Lord Methuen's work. But it would be rash to assume such favourable conditions. We must be prepared for the spectacle of hard and prolonged fighting in Natal, and for the heavy losses that accompany it. The better our troops come out of their trials the more are we bound to ask ourselves how it came about that they were set to fight under difficulties, usually against superior numbers, though the British force devoted to the war was larger than the whole Boer army? The cause of this is that a small force was sent out on September 8th, and nothing more ordered until October 7th, and the cause of that arrangement was that the Government, as Mr. Balfour has naively told us, never believed that there would be a war, or that the Free State would join the Transvaal, until the forces of both States were on the move. Our statesmen negotiated through June, July, and August, talked in July of "putting their hands to the plough," and yet took no step to meet the possibility that the Boers would prove in earnest and attack the British colonies until the Boer riflemen were assembling at Standerton and patrolling into Natal. Does not this argue a defect in the training of our public men, a defect which may be described as ignorance of the nature of war and of the way in which it should be provided for? Mr. Balfour admits that his eyes have been opened, but does not that imply that they had been shut when they ought to have been open? If the members of the Government failed to take the situation seriously in June, what is to be thought of the members of the Opposition, some of whom even now cannot see that the choice was between abandoning Empire and coercing the Boers? The moral is that we should, if possible, strengthen the Government by sending to Parliament representatives of the younger school, which is National and Imperialist rather than Conservative or Liberal.

THE DELAY OF REINFORCEMENTS

December 7th, 1899

The conditions in South Africa are still critical; indeed, more so than ever. There are three campaigns in progress, and, though there are good grounds for hoping that in each case the balance will turn in favour of the British, the hope rests rather upon faith than upon that numerical superiority which it is the first duty of a Government to give to its generals.

Lord Methuen's advance came to a pause after the battle of Modder River, now nine days ago. There appear to have been good reasons for the delay. First of all, it is necessary that when, or soon after, Kimberley is reached the railway to De Aar should be available both for the removal of non-combatants, and for the transport of provisions, ammunition and guns. This involves the repair in some way of the bridge at Modder River. Next, it was proved-by that battle, in which the Boer force was large enough to make the victory most difficult, and by the arrival after the battle of fresh Boer forces, that Lord Methuen's force was not strong enough for its work. If a whole day and heavy loss were needed to bring about the retreat of eleven thousand Boers from a prepared position it might be impracticable for Lord Methuen without more force to drive away fifteen or eighteen thousand Boers from a prepared position at Spytfontein, and the possibility of such a body of Boers being at that point had to be reckoned with. Lord Methuen needed more infantry, more artillery, and more cavalry. Of none of the three arms had General Forestier-Walker any abundant supply. If he has sent on, besides a cavalry regiment, the whole of the Highland brigade and three batteries of artillery, Lord Methuen would be none too strong. It is essential that, having started, he should defeat the Boers again and reach Kimberley, for a failure would be a disaster. I have great confidence in Lord Methuen and his troops; what determination and bravery can do they will accomplish, and I feel pretty sure that in a day or two we shall have news of another victory and of the relief of Kimberley. But why has the paramount power in South Africa sent a fine general and splendid troops to face heavy odds and to run the risk of finding themselves over-tasked by superior numbers?

If we put the most liberal construction on General Walker's account of what he has done to reinforce Lord Methueh there are now fifteen battalions, five batteries, and two cavalry regiments north of De Aar. To protect the great depôt of military stores at De Aar and the railway from that point to the Cape a considerable force is needed, and to stem the tide of Boer invasion and Dutch disaffection, which has spread from the Orange River to Tarkastad and Dordrecht, from Colesberg to Barkly East, a further large force is badly wanted. But in the whole of Cape Colony south of the Orange River there appear to be only nine battalions, perhaps a couple of regiments of cavalry, and on the most favourable assumption five batteries. Of these battalions Sir William Gatacre has half-a-dozen on the lines running north from Algoa Bay and East London, the greater part at Putters Kraal, north of Queenstown. This is a tiny force with which to clear an invaded and disaffected area of twelve thousand square miles. We may be perfectly certain that Sir William Gatacre will do the best that can be done with his force, and if that should be more than his numbers alone would lead us to expect the reason will be that Lord Methuen's victories will have made the Free State Boers uneasy about their road home. A fresh victory near Kimberley and the effectual relief of that place will lighten Sir William Gatacre's load.

The centre of gravity is in Natal, where the greater part of the Boer army and the greater part of the British force in South Africa are confronting one another. There are three British divisions, strong in infantry but weak in artillery, and there is cavalry enough for a strong division. But one of the divisions has been invested and bombarded with more or less persistence since the beginning of November, and the other two are not yet known to be quite ready to move. Sir George White's force is reported to be on short rations, and some of the messages from correspondents in Ladysmith declared a week ago that it was high time for relief to come. The force can hardly be as yet near the limit of its resisting powers, but it is evidently nearing the stage when after relief it will need rest and recuperation instead of being ready for a vigorous and prolonged advance. General Buller with two divisions will shortly set out to force the passage of the Tugela and to fight his way round Ladysmith, either on the east or on the west, so as to cut off either the retreat to the Free State or that to the Transvaal of the Boer army. If Sir Redvers Buller can in this way win a victory in which the enemy is not merely pushed back, but controlled in his choice of the direction of his retirement, the issue of the campaign in Natal will be settled, and the British Commander will be able to consider his great purpose—the crushing of the Boer armies. The long wrestle between Sir George White and the Boers has no doubt produced a state of exhaustion on both sides, and by the time the decision comes exhaustion will be turned into collapse. If, as we trust, it should be a Boer collapse, Sir Redvers Buller's best policy, if practicable, will be to follow up a success with the utmost promptitude and vigour, to push on through the mountains, and open a doorway into the country beyond them. A check to Sir Redvers Buller's advance would be disastrous. He can take no more troops from the Cape. The fifth division can hardly be at his disposal before Christmas, for the first transport did not start till November 24th, and the last has not yet left. But a check means insufficient force, and is as a rule to be made good only by reinforcement. It is clear, then, that Sir Redvers Buller must not be checked; he must cross the Tugela and must win his battle. I think that with his twenty thousand men he may be trusted to do both, even if the Boer force is as large as the highest estimates that have been given.

The four decisions pending—at Kimberley, north of Queenstown, at Ladysmith, and on the Tugela—are here represented as all doubtful. I do not expect any of them to go wrong, but it is wise before a fight to reckon with possibilities, and where the enemy, stubborn, well-armed, and skilful, has also the advantage of numbers, it would be folly not to consider the possibility that he may hold his ground. There are elements of success on the British side that should not be forgotten. The British soldier to-day, as in the past, proves to be a staunch support to any general. To-day, however, he has leaders who, taking them all round, are probably better qualified than any of their predecessors. The divisional generals are all picked for their known grip of the business of war; among the brigadiers there are such devoted students of their profession as Lyttelton and Hildyard, and the younger officers of to-day are more zealous in their business and better instructed than at any previous period. There should be less in this war than in any that the British Army has waged of that incompetence of the subordinates which in past campaigns has often caused the commanders more anxiety than all the enemy's doings.

Yet at every point the Boers appear to outnumber our troops. The question arises how this came about; either the Government has not sent troops enough, or the force given to the Commander-in-Chief has been wrongly distributed. Sir Redvers Buller has done the best he could in difficult conditions. Ladysmith had to be relieved, and he has taken more than half of his force for the purpose. He might have wished to take a third division, but if he had done so Kimberley might have fallen, and the rising at the Cape have spread so fast and so far that the defeat of Joubert would not have restored the balance. Accordingly the smaller half of the force was left in the Cape Colony. Here also there were two tasks. To push back the invasion was a slow business, and if meantime Kimberley had fallen, the insurrection would have become general. Accordingly a minimum force was set to stem the invasion and a maximum force devoted to the relief of Kimberley. The difficulties, therefore, arose not merely from the strategy in South Africa but from the delay of the Government to send enough troops in time. The fact that Sir George White with a small force was left for two months unsupported produced the rising at the Cape, and compelled the division of the British Army Corps, in, consequence of which the whole force is reduced to a perilous numerical weakness at each of four points. But the Army Corps, the cavalry division, and the force for the line of communications, have now to wait three weeks before they can be strengthened. It was known to the Government before the end of October that Ladysmith would be invested and need relief, that the Cape Dutch would rise, and that unless Kimberley were helped the rising would become dangerous. Yet the despatch of the first transport of the fifth division was delayed until November 24th. Has the Government even now begun to take the war seriously? Do the members of the Cabinet at this eleventh hour understand that failure to crush the Boers means breakdown for the Empire, and that a prolonged struggle with them carries with it grave danger of the intervention of other Powers? Does Lord Lansdowne continue to direct the movement of reinforcements according to his own unmilitary judgment modified by that of one or more of his unmilitary colleagues? I decline to believe that Lord Wolseley has arranged or accepted without protest this new system of sending out the Army in fragments, each of which may be invested or used up before the next can arrive.

THE NATION'S PROBLEM

December 14th, 1899

The failure of Lord Methuen's attack at Magersfontein has brought home to every mind the extreme gravity of the situation in South Africa, and it seems most likely that in the western theatre of war the crisis has issued in a decision unfavourable to the British cause.

It is well to keep the whole before our eyes even when examining a part, so I begin with a bird's-eye view. In Natal Sir Redvers Buller seems to be ready, and to be about to strike, for the advance of Barton's brigade towards Colenso must be the prelude to the advance of the main body to the right or the left to cross the Tugela above or below the broken railway bridge. If Sir Redvers Buller is so fortunate as to bring the principal Boer army to an action and to defeat it so thoroughly as seriously to impair its fighting power, the balance in the eastern theatre of war will have turned, and attention may be concentrated upon the restoration of the position in the west. There the balance has turned the wrong way. General Gatacre's defeat at Stormberg would not be a very serious matter, for his force was small, were it not that it damages the credit of British generalship, and that it must have given a great stimulus not only to the Free State army but to the rebellion of the Cape Boers. For the Boers Stormberg is a great victory, which will encourage them to fresh enterprises in a country where at least every second Dutch farmer is their friend and ally. They may, therefore, be expected to turn their attention as soon as they can to Lord Methuen's communications. This probability rendered Lord Methuen's position at Modder River doubly critical. On Sunday he was ready, and set out to test his fate. On Tuesday he was back again in his camp, the measure of his defeat being given by his assurance that in his camp he was in perfect security. Those are ominous words, for they have not the air of the man who does not know that he is beaten, and who means to try again at once. It is, however, conceivable that, as the defeat seems to have been caused by an inexplicable blunder, the marching of a brigade in the dark in dense formation close up to the muzzles of the enemy's rifles, the effort may be made to attack again with better dispositions. A second attack would, of course, be attended with twofold risks, but if it has no chance of success the defeat already suffered must be reckoned a disaster. If Lord Methuen is definitely beaten, Kimberley must be set down as lost, and the question is of the safety of Lord Methuen's division. In that case to remain at Modder River is to court investment, which would last for many weeks. The risk would not be justified unless there is in the camp an ample store of supplies and ammunition, and even then it is not clear what purpose it would serve. If, therefore, the defeat is decisive the proper course is a retreat to a position of which the communications can be protected, and which cannot easily be turned. The whole situation, then, is failure in the Cape Colony on both lines, coupled with an impending action in Natal, of which, until it is over, a favourable result, though there is reason to hope for it, had better not be too lightly assumed. Yet the British purpose of the war is to establish the British power in South Africa on a firm basis: the only way to prepare that basis being to crush the military power of the two Republics. The British forces now in South Africa are clearly not strong enough to do their work. What is the Nation to do in order to accomplish the task which it has undertaken?

A nation can act only through its Government, and, as at this moment the British Nation is united in the resolve to fight this war out, the Government has, without looking back, to give a lead. The first thing is for the Cabinet to convince the public that it is doing all that can be done, and doing it in the right way. But the public does not trust its own judgment. That much-talked-of person the man in the street does not fancy himself a general, and is not over-fond of the military critic—the unfortunate man whose duties have compelled him to try to qualify himself, to form a judgment about war. There is a sound instinct that war is a special business, and that it should be managed according to the judgment of those who are masters of the trade; not those who can write about it, but those who have practised it and proved their capacity. But those men, the generals who are, believed to have a grasp of the way to carry a war through, are all outside the Cabinet. The Cabinet has its chosen expert adviser, the Commander-in-Chief; but rumour or surmise hints that his advice has been by no means uniformly followed. Surely the wisest course which the Cabinet could now adopt would be to call Lord Wolseley to their board as an announcement and a guarantee that in the prosecution of the war his judgment was given its true place, and that nothing thought by him necessary or desirable was being left undone. If the military judgment holds that more force is required the extra force must be provided. There are, after the Regular Army and the Marines, the whole of the Militia, the Volunteers, and thousands of trained men in the British colonies. There is no difficulty, seeing that the Nation is determined to keep on its course, about drawing upon these forces to any extent that may be required. If there are constitutional forms to be fulfilled they can be fulfilled; if Parliamentary sanction is needed it can be had for the asking.

At the present rate of consumption the fifth division will hardly have been landed before its energies will be absorbed, and unless Sir Redvers Buller is peculiarly fortunate during the next few days, the fifth and sixth divisions together will not be enough to change the present adverse situation into one of decided British preponderance. There should be at the Cape a reservoir of forces upon which the British Commander should be able to draw until he can drive the enemy before him. When that stage comes the flow of reinforcements might be suspended, but to stay or delay it before that stage has been reached is to court misfortune.

Something might probably be done to block the channel through which the enemy derives some of his resources and some of his information. The telegraph cable at Delagoa Bay might with advantage have its shore end lifted into a British man-of-war. There must be ways and means of stopping all intercourse through Portuguese territory between the Transvaal and the sea. That this is desirable is manifest, and to such cases may be applied the maxim, "Where there is a will there is a way."

The idea seems to be spreading that this war must lead to a thorough overhauling and recasting of the British military organisation. But if you are to make a bigger army, an army better suited to the times and to the needs of the Nation, you must begin by getting a competent army-creating instrument. You cannot expect a Cabinet of twelve or eighteen men ignorant of war to create a good war-fighting machine. You cannot entrust the organisation of your Army to any authority but the Government, for the body that creates your Army will govern you. The only plan that will produce the result required is to give authority over the making and using of the Army to a man or men who understand War—War as it is to-day. In short, a Nation that is liable to War requires men of War in its Government, and, in the case of Great Britain, the place for them is in the Cabinet. The traditional practice of having a civilian Minister inside the Cabinet with all the authority, and a soldier with all the knowledge outside the Cabinet, was devised for electioneering purposes, and not for war. The plan has answered its object very well for many years, having secured Cabinets against any intrusion of military wisdom upon their domestic party felicity. But now that the times have changed, and that the chief business of a Cabinet is to manage a war, it seems unwise to keep the military judgment locked out. Party felicity was valuable some years ago when there was a demand for it; but the fashions have changed. To-day the article in demand is not eloquence nor the infallibility of "our side," whichever that may be; the article in demand to-day is the organisation of victory. That is not to be had at all the shops. Those who can supply it are very special men, who must be found and their price paid. The Nation has given bail for the production of this particular article, and if it is not forthcoming in time the forfeit must be paid. The bail is the British Empire.

MORE AWAKENING

December 21st, 1899

A week ago, while we were thinking over failure in the Cape Colony on both lines of advance, we could still hope for success on what circumstances had made the most important line, in Natal. But now there has been failure in Natal also.

Of the battle of Colenso Sir Redvers Buller's telegraphic despatch, though it probably does the commander less justice than he would have received at the hands of any other narrator, gives an authoritative if meagre account. The attack seems to have been planned rather as a reconnaissance in force, to be followed up in case it should reveal possibilities of victory, than as a determined effort on which everything was to be staked. In all probability this form of action was inevitable in the conditions. The Boers held a strong position, covered in front by a river fordable at only two points. Such a position can hardly be reconnoitred except by attack. It could not be turned except by a long flank march, which, if successful would have occupied several days, during which the camp and railhead would have to be strongly guarded. There is reason to believe that the force in Natal has not the transport necessary to enable it to leave the railway for several days, during which it would be a flying column. Moreover, the Boers, being all mounted, could always place themselves across the path of any advance. Accordingly it is at least premature to assume that any course other than that which he adopted was open to Sir Redvers Buller. The mishap to a portion of the artillery will be better understood when the full story of the battle is accessible. Meanwhile Sir Redvers Buller's withdrawal of the troops when he saw that success was unattainable has preserved his force, and he is now awaiting reinforcement before again attempting an advance. The critical element in the position of affairs in Natal lies in the fact that time runs against the British. Sir Redvers Buller and the Government no doubt know pretty accurately the date up to which Sir George White can hold Ladysmith. If by that date he has neither been relieved nor succeeded in fighting his way to the Tugela his situation will be desperate.