fleets for all eventualities, to commission every ship in the navy and
to have all the fleets ready in their intended stations, so that only an
order by cable may be needed to set them to work; secondly, to have all
the coast defences manned and ready thirdly, to have the volunteer
brigades encamped in the defensive positions round London, for which
they are destined; and, lastly, but not least, to have the rest of the
forces at home encamped near great railway centres as field divisions of
regulars, field divisions of militia, and field divisions of volunteers,
with ammunition, transport and supplies attached to them. If these
measures had already been carried out there would be no intervention. If
they are now carried out without loss of time, intervention may be
prevented. If they are much longer postponed intervention becomes
probable; the great war may be expected, and no man can foretell whether
the British Empire, if again taken by surprise and unready, can weather
the storm.
THE COLLAPSE OF THE BOER POWER
_March 8th_, 1900
Lord Roberts yesterday defeated the Boers near Poplar's Drift. In order
to measure the importance of the event it may be well to begin by a
rough general survey of the condition of affairs.
There have long been signs that the Boer Power was subjected to a very
great strain by the effort made to hold, against ever-increasing British
forces, a number of points upon the circumference of a very large area.
The Boers were attacking Mafeking and Kimberley, and covering their
action at both points by forces intended to delay the relieving columns.
They were also endeavouring to support rebellion throughout a great
tract of country in the Cape Colony, extending from Prieska on the west
to the Basuto border on the east, and covering the rebels by parties
posted to resist the advance of Gatacre and French along the railways
from the south coast to the Orange River. These two groups of
enterprises were but the subordinate features of a campaign in which the
principal undertaking was the reduction of Ladysmith, which involved a
prolonged and stubborn resistance to the repeated assaults of Sir
Redvers Buller.
Thus the Boer Governments, or their commander-in-chief, set out at the
beginning to do many things at the same time. There were few British
troops in the country, and there was the possibility of great success,
at least in the shape of the occupation of territory, before the British
forces could be assembled. But shortly after the arrival of Sir Redvers
Buller's Army Corps it began to be evident that the Boer forces were
balanced by the British. There was a pause in the movements. The British
made little headway and the Boers none. Yet, as both sides were doing
their best, it was clear that the Boers required the utmost exertion of
all their energies to maintain the equilibrium. This condition may be
said to have lasted from about the middle of December to the middle of
February. During those two months, however, while the Boers were at
full tension, the British were gathering new forces behind their front
line, which itself was all the time receiving gradual accessions of
strength.
When Lord Roberts with fifty thousand men burst through the Boer cordon
and destroyed the force with which Cronje had been covering the siege of
Kimberley, the Boers had no reserve of force with which to fill up the
gap. Every man sent to Cronje's assistance had to be taken from some
other post where he was sorely needed. The detachments sent from Natal
into the Free State left the Natal Army, already wearied by its long
unsuccessful siege of Ladysmith, and by Buller's persistent attacks, too
weak to continue at once the siege and the resistance to Buller. But the
two tasks were inseparable, and when Buller renewed his attack and drove
the Boers from their posts south of the Tugela, the Boer army of Natal
found itself able to cover its retreat only by a last desperate
rearguard action at Pieters.
Defeat in the Free State and collapse in Natal were accompanied by the
abandonment of the effort to support the rebellion in Cape Colony.
This general breakdown following upon prolonged over-exertion, and
accompanied in the two principal regions by complete defeat, must have
had its effects on the spirits of the troops. Hope must be gone and
despair at hand, and the consequent diminution of power is sure to be
considerable. There is no sign as yet of any strong leadership such as
could to some extent restore the fortunes of the Boer army. The retreat
beyond the Orange River has been gradual; the siege of Mafeking has not
been abandoned, and there is no sign of a determined concentration of
forces to oppose Lord Roberts.
Since the surrender of Cronje on February 27th, Lord Roberts has been
completing his supplies, and probably making good the damage to his
transport caused by the loss of a convoy on the Riet River. He has also
brought up the Guards Brigade as a reinforcement. A few days ago the
camp was moved forward from Paardeberg to Osfontein, and beyond
Osfontein the Boers were observed collecting their troops from day to
day and extending their position, which ran roughly north and south
across the Modder. Yesterday Lord Roberts advanced to the attack with
three and a half infantry divisions, a cavalry division and a brigade of
mounted infantry. The cavalry, followed by an infantry division, turned
the enemy's left flank, and by noon the enemy's army was in full retreat
towards the north and east, pursued by the British. The Boers have this
time not ventured to stand to fight. They have seen themselves assailed
in front by a force which must have greatly outnumbered them at the same
time that their flank was turned by a force as mobile as their own.
Their precipitate retreat coming after their late defeats must increase
their demoralisation, and it will hardly be practicable for them to make
a fresh stand east of the Free State Railway. Lord Roberts will be on
the railway with the bulk of his force by Saturday or Sunday, and his
presence there will complete the break up of the Boer defences of the
Orange River.
The situation of the Boers is now, as far as it depends on themselves,
desperate. They can hardly collect forty thousand men for a decisive
battle, and are confronted by two armies, each of which has that
strength, the one nearing Bloemfontein, the other at Ladysmith. Lord
Roberts, when he reaches the railway, will probably call up from the
Orange River such additional forces as are not required as garrisons in
Cape Colony. His numbers can be fed by constant small reinforcements,
while the Boers have no means of increasing their numbers. With each
succeeding week, therefore, the British will grow stronger and the Boers
fewer. The utmost that the Boer commander-in-chief can expect to
accomplish is to delay that advance to Pretoria which he cannot prevent.
He may perhaps bring about the fall of Mafeking, if he chooses to
dispense for a few weeks longer with the reinforcements which Commandant
Snyman by raising the siege could bring to his main army. There was
indeed some days ago an unofficial report that a strong column was
moving north from Kimberley. If that were true the destination of the
column must have been Mafeking, but it is not clear what its composition
could be. The Guards Brigade being at Poplar's Drift there would be left
the other brigade of the first division, and that may be on its way
towards the north. Resistance was expected at the passage of the Vaal at
Fourteen Streams, but that point must have already been reached.
Probably nothing will be heard of this column until it has accomplished
its task, except in the not very probable event of hard fighting between
Winsorton and Mafeking. Colonel Baden-Powell is known to be very hard
pressed, being short of provisions and of troops. It is certain the
column will make every effort to reach Mafeking in time, but the
distance is great. The best chance of success would be found in the
despatch of a large body of mounted troops to move in the fashion of the
great raiding expeditions of the American Civil War; but it is doubtful
whether sufficient mounted troops were or are available.
Apart from their own resources the Boers may hope for help from outside.
They have from the beginning looked for the intervention of some great
Power, for the assistance of the Dutch party at the Cape, and for such
action by the British Opposition as might embarrass the Government in
its resolve to prosecute the war to its logical conclusion.
Intervention will not be undertaken by any Power that is not prepared to
go to war, and does not see a fair prospect of success in an attack upon
the British Empire. Intervention therefore will be prevented if the Navy
is kept ready for any emergency, and if the Government measures for
arming the Nation are so carried out as to convince continental Powers
that they will produce an appreciable result. That conviction does not
yet exist, but it is not too late to create it.
The Cape Dutch will not be able to embarrass a British Government that
knows its own mind and is resolved to treat them fairly while asserting
its authority in the Transvaal and the Free State. The peace at any
price party at home is trying hard to press its false doctrines, but in
the present temper of the Nation has no chance of success, provided only
that the Government carries out without hesitation or vacillation the
policy to which it is by all its action committed, of bringing the
territories of the Boer Republics under British administration so soon
as the military power of the Boers has been broken.