GENERAL KUROPATKIN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLII, Issue 12819, 20 March 1905, Page 4

GENERAL KUROPATKIN.

The recall of Kuropatkin is not astonishing when we consider that a scapegoat must always be found by incompetent Administrations, and that the defeated general has himself solicited relief from his command. After the contradictory statements made as to the defence of Port Arthur it may seem hardly possible to form any accurate opinion upon the resistance made by the Russians to the Japanese advance up the Manchurian railway. Two points, however, seem absolutely certain: that Kuropatkin has from the first regarded himself as outnumbered and over-powered, and has consistently urged a campaign of retreat and delay while reinforcements were being poured in behind him; and that the Russians have not fought in 1905 with anything like the stubbornness that distinguished them in 1901. In 1904, Kuropatkin almost beat back the Japanese at Liao-yang, and would have done so had it not been for_the success of Kuroki's flanking movement on his eastward wing. He covered Mukden for the winter, after the Japanese had anticipated occupying it during the autumn. He has generally been regarded as having done wonders in that most hopeless of military situations. a campaign in which he was compelled to act against his better judgment by peremptory orders from headquarters. After Port Arthur was invested he was ordered to advance to its relief, although he was desirous of falling back upon Harbin. After Liao-yang he was again ordered to advance south, against his opinion, with the result that he lost disastrously at a

time when all his strength needed conserving. He was ordered to defend Mukden, which he knew to be comparatively indefensible. And as if this were not enough, the spirit was taken out of bis troops by the terrible news of massacre and revolt at home, due to the refusal of the Tsar to listen to the clamour for reform. Upon the surface of things, Kuropatkin appears to be well entitled to sympathy.