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troops were withdrawn from Glencoe--Dundee, or the whole force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.