SCIENCE AND THE AFGHAN WAR.

Evening Post, Volume XVII, Issue 548, 28 June 1879, Page 1 (Supplement)

SCIENCE AND THE AFGHAN WAR.

We regret to see from the Times correspondent at Daka that, notwithstanding all that science has done for warfare, the Afghan war has been an unscientific one. "India," he states, "ia unprepared for scientific war. The enemy, like ourselves, possesses arms of precision and artillery. Their artillery at Ali Musjid and the Peiwar Kotal was probably equal, if not superior to our own. Rookets, however, so easily carried over "tough mountain roads, and so terrifying to barbarians from their eocentrio course, exciting their astonishment more than any other appliances of art except the telegraph, have never been introduced in the campaign. Nor have any steam launches been sent to traverse the navigable Cabul River, explore its windinga, and secure the left flank from gatherings of the enemy. No limo- lights or other lights, of which science boasts so many, have ever been supplied to prevent the enemy perpetually harassing our troops and disturbing their much- j needed repose by creeping within range, under cover of night, and firing into oor camp." This is rather disheartening, and we trust that ia the campaign against the Zulus more attention will be paid to recent applications of science, and that, for example, night surprises will be made impossible by the use of one or other form of light which by a little ingenuity might be mad'? to light up all the ground around «ny position.