KITCHENERS GREAT BLUFF

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2555, 1 September 1915, Page 5

KITCHENERS GREAT BLUFF

HIS MYSTERIOUS ARMY HOW THE GERMANS WERE HOODWINKED x' - —■ Mr. J. Herbert Duckworth, cm Ens« - lisli journalist, contributes an Article 3 to an American magazino in which ho s describes how Kitchener's army' v.-es sccretly increased from - 1,000,000 to f. -±,000,000 men,.'right under' tho very n ?n, os of tll(J übiquitous ■ German .spies, ii "Ibis feat of clothing, arming, ami 0 training this mighty host, and of then, c smuggling it out oi si supposedly sub- - marine-blockaded island to France, has e no parallel, in history. As an oxhibi- - tion of high strategy alonb it surpasses 1 tho finest: performances in tbo field of - either; General JofFie or' General von e tiindenburg. ', i completely deceived tlio German t General Staff as to England's military strongth, and confounded the' Teutonic i, theorists who had _ always maintained tnat.it was impossible to make a sol- ' 9 in loss than threo years. This s guin joko on tho Kaiser was concocted i- ».y Lord Kitchener himself. He comis mandeered tho services of the Press to v !fS s Ii hlm to c ? rr y ouii tho groat bluff, ', j ?-ia there cau be no ham now in tcllt ing how, it was done. . - 0 "K.'s" Scheme. fit ~^l O British Secretary of • , c tato J? r V nr first conceived the idea of putting into the field '4,000,000 men, ,) he realised that it would be a gravo , strategic blunder to allow the enemy-to know what was really afoot. Rather, ' the game should be to call for 1,000,000 t , lcli I'ress-agent the world i> K stories lamenting _the fact that, at h last, the British Empire was* about to r- crumble up because the men of England > had not.-the pluck to defend it. All is io German stories that the modern " :s Englishman had become ; effete and ' an l a i «me were, indeed, too true! ' ;. lhe scheme ivorked out admirably. o Rccruitmg was phenomenally brisk from' 1 " p. tho first, let the Germans eagerly y swallowed, the skilfully phrased yarns.' a that were published broadcast, that told; how only conscription .would save the British from utter disaster.. "While thd .-, cartoonists and-funny verse writers of i tUe rest of the world were holding up to ndicule the sport-loving Englishman, who was supposed to be refusing to . shoulder a gun in defenfcc of his hearth ! i J 1 , 01 " 6 '- P, reat Britain was rapidly. and thoroughly building lip her ow£ big Steam Roller. , • • Last winter in London I was privii-: !? ge S to meet Lieutenant-Colonel Sir H.-" U Schlater, Adjutant-General to<: thd .- .Aofoes, at an informal luncheon." Wii was not discussed. But as the party. 0 l\ as a l>? ut to break up somebody asked : the adjutant, the one'man, mind -you. _ who could have answered the question:' s Ji 0W mal W men are there in Kitchen- ' • n™. a p m i y - Lookll) g squarely into the fci eyes of us questioner, Sir H; C. Schla* ; ter replied: 'I don't know.' A Campaign of Silence. ' "The campaign of silence was con« ducted on strictly, scientific lines. The' newspaper editors were first warned that anj indiscretion, would mean a court- ■ martial, under tho Defence of the Realm! V ' • r ! eS c °i hav j ng ' 6 P read "Ports tile, success of 1 His Majesty's forces.' They were instructed to only lhe,recruiting ' . returns eent out by the War Office. In- " ? C S ent taking,was strictly j forbidden. All articles on the new " « rm A Qn . d ? ve ? P ictur 6S.of soldiers, hid ' nrst to be submitted to the censor. A permit was required even to own a camera. [ , ' Tho English have the reputation of . ug ni^ u through' most of their wars., Ihey are muddling through this one, but for once there has been method m the muddling. : Tricks and subterruges, cunning and innumerable, were , adopted m order to hoodniuk the enemy ,as to size, and disposition of the new! • ariny. Battalions of tho sanie regiment \ were,trained in different parts of the . country. -Instead of creating new corps > old ones were increased to colossal pro-/ 1 portions. The Manchester Regiment, for i instance, grew from 4 to 30 battalions ■ i —to 36,000 men. \Of course, it was ob- - ™ us to the |most. casual observer that i Great Britain was getting togother a . tremendous army. But who could say, whether it numbered 2,000,000 or 4,000 j 000 men? ~ . , , ' ' was ever said about the . 000,000 very, effioient Territorials. And yet t'heso men virtually belonged to " Kitchener's army. Men who enlisted' m the Territorial forces, after the, de- - claration of war undertook the same obligations ap the men in the regular arliiy. The: old.members,...recruiteS for. home defence only, were-easily brought into line. They were paraded before their colonels, who-would bawl out: " 'Aiiy man.-who doesn't want'to go : into the trenches please stop one paw v to'the front.' v ■ , | n \ - -- N "' i" ' Extraordinary-secrecy. • "When it came to moving tlio nevr ' . troops, to France, extraordinarv precau- i tions were' taken to mislead -fhe spies. The regiments were not all transported from Soutluimpton to ; Boulogne or , 'Havre, Instead they were shipped fromwhat were rfcally out of the way and inconvenient, ports—Bristol, Avonmonth, .Cardiff, Swansea, .and Barrow,-' foil example—to French ports as far fromi tho firing St. Malo, Brost, and ' ■ oven Bordeaux on the west coast and Marseilles on the Mediterranean. Troop trains were invariably moved at night 1 with drawn\blinds. Ofteii-times they , Were run half-way around the country] beforo. being sneaJted alongside'a trans- • port. -Not even the officers were aware of their, nltimato destination—whether , - it was to be France, Egypt, India, or the Dardanelles. . , ■ ■ "Tho • engine-drivers were ohanged every twenty miles or so, and the cap- ! tains of tho troopships received their filial instructions by wireless after they had put to .sea. Last spring, when the •movement of Kitchener's army was in full swing, I visited Ryde, in the Isl»"~ of Wight. One day a fleet of at least 30 transports collected in the Solent. Nobody Knew-where they- liad- corns from. At dusk a score of 40-knot tor- • pedo-boat destroyers', the escort, put irt ■ an appearance. When night fell 1 nothing could be seen but, tho searclilighta sweeping the <gitrance to Portsmouth! ' Harbour, on the mainland, for enemy, periscopes. In the morning transports and destroyers had gone. ' : - "What was the secret of Lord Kitchener's success in so easily persuiding 4,000,000 men voluntarily; to enlist? It ': was advertising. A very few days after England had decided to enter tho con- * diet millions of posters calling for volunteers to enlist, for'the period of the war only* were plastered up.' The whole country, from John o' Groat's to Land's End, looked like one huge bill-board. It was the biggest and most thorough' advertising campaign ever conceived and' successfully carried, out."