What Can Russia Do Now?

Manawatu Standard, Volume XL, Issue 7939, 22 October 1904, Page 7

What Can Russia Do Now?

The Russian army has sustained crushing,1 overwhelming, irretrievable defeat. General Kuropatkin had the advantage of the initiative—the disposition of his forces was of his own choosing—be claimed to be superior in numbers. Both armies were familiar with the ground, aad they each left de. fences, and met pii; a battlefield b?r tweeh. * Only at Wafangkau were the conditions similar, and there the Japanese proved their superiority. Here at every point of the field, on the right wing, in the centre,' and on the left wing,-the.story is the ■"• same-rßussian disaster. To, make the- comparison"the stronger; "the : .Russian? troops—from Eurogej knost of them—-proved themselves .able? to stand firm and die. It means that/as tacticians, as fighters, as men, the Japanese are superior to the Slav. The qualities that make nations great are no longer the exclusive posses: sion of the European. ;'■:. What can Russia do now. ? X ■; She. has not won a single battle—not a skirmish, in which the conditions were at all equal, She cannot maintain at any.

point of .the Railway east of Baikal an army * stronger than that General Kuropatkin had with him when he began his advance. The Japanese are prepared to maintain 500,000 men in Manehqria right through next year. These troops could not be beaten out of Manchuria by double their number of Russians. Great country though she is, Russia has been defeated by Japan, and must sooner or later bow to the inevitable. There is no prospect of recovery, for the next campaign would be a repetition of the first. Her social conditions will have to be reconstituted before she can produce an army intelligent enough and high spirited enough to cope with the redoubtable Japanese.—Auckland Herald.