Rotten to the Core.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 879, 4 January 1889, Page 27

Rotten to the Core.

The patriotic exultation with which Englishmen received the news of General Grenfell’s brilliant victory in the Soudan over Osman Digna has speedily been succeeded . by a painful revulsion of feeliDg. It is stated that many of the weapons supplied to the British forces proved utterly worthless when the strain of battle came. The revolvers would not work, and the swords bent double in the hands of their wielders. And now we learn that the War Office is panic-stricken under the terrible apprehension that all the arms furnished to the British cavalry may in reality be equally untrustworthy. This state of things, if true, is indeed enough to excite a general panic throughout the British Empire. England’s defensive preparations against the attack to which she may at any time be exposed through some unforeseen incident, are pronounced by the most capable judges to be ludicrous in their insufficiency, even assuming that such provision as has been made is genuine. But' if the mere hand ful of troops which Great Britain has as compared with the huge armed and trained multitudes of all other first-class Powers, are in reality not armed at all—or at any rate a large proportion of their number—but are supplied only with weapons as useless as a schoolboy’s popgun or lath sword would be in actual battle, the disagreeable conclusion follows that even the limited means of defence presumably possessed by England must be largely discounted in practice. If the swords of the cavalry, the bayonets of the infantry, and the cutlasses of the sailors bend and twist into barrelhoops or corkscrews directly they come in contact with such au obstacle as a human body, it is clear that those deluded soldiere would be far more efficiently armed if stout oaken cudgels were served out to them instead. The amazing and disheartening phase of the affair is that after the previous disgraceful exposure of the worthlessness of the weapons issued to the British troops, no steps should have been taken to render a recurrence of such a fraud impossible. It is really difficult to decide in which direction most blame is due—whether to the scoundrels of contractors who thus defraud the country “ all in the way of trade,” or to the military authorities through whose gross negligence, it nob connivance, the fraud was rendered practicable. We are inclined to think the authorities the more blameworthy of the two, for they not only, by their carelessness (to say the least), encouraged the contractors to practice the fraud, but also assisted in its perpetration by accepting and paying for the defective arms. How came these to be “ passed ” by the authorities? Evidently there must have been either an utterly perfunctory and inadequate examination, or else collusion. The latter has been more than, once suspected, and it is to be feared, that the evil has not yet been probed to the bottom. One can hardly imagine a more infamous species of treason. A general failure of weapons in the event of war would mean the utter ruin of the country, to say nothing of the frightful sacrifice of British lives. Those upon whose heads would rest the blame could not but be regarded as worse than murderers, and it is no mere figure of speech to say that “ hanging is too good for them.” One is inclined to sympathise cordially with Mark Twain’s hearty approvaL of the manner in which Xerxes “rebuked” the “ shoddy contractors ” who built that unsound bridge of boats. The rebuke, it will be remembered, was simply decapitation !. Nothing less than capital punishment would meet the’ - ' djeserts o,f the swindlers who haye palmed upon the country defective weapons, and of the military authorities who accepted and issued them. If the weary sentinel who falls asleep at his post is doomed to death by the laws of w&r because his momentary £.2g*igenee might result in surely no less is due to the greater offenders who wilfully or negligently betray a whole army to destruction. What with these revelations as to the value of the arms with which England’s troops are equipped, and the remarkable series of naval and artillery mishaps recorded during the present year, it must be confessed that the prospect of a war would be more than ordinarily alarming. That the soldiers

and sailors of Great Britain would do their duty as gallantly as ever goes without saying, but where would be the üb6 if they had no weapons to do their duty with ? If the ships won’t steam or Bteer, it the big guns are terrible and fatal only to those who work them —and among whom they spread wholesale devastation when they habitually burst; if the rifles only carry half as far and fire a tenth as fast as those of the enemy—so that our soldiers would be liable to be all shot down before they could get within their own arms’ range of the enemy ; if swords and bayonets of tin are to be opposed to those of tempered steel, England’s chance against even the weakest foe would be a poor one indeed. Surely these successive exposures will at last arouse the people of England to their imminent peril, and impel them to insist on the total change of that “ system ” which has so long been a synonym for everything that is rotten and miserable and unworthy of a great nation, a system which killed in the Crimea tenfold more English soldiers than fell at the hands of the .Russians ! It is to be hoped that the lesson taught by these discreditable experiences will not be lost ou the New Zealand Defence authorities. Evidently the munitions of war received from Home cannot be deemed trustworthy as a matter of course, and should be carefully inspected and tested before any reliance is placed on them as provisions for future possible contingencies. Events march apace nowadays, and after all our heavy outlay on defensive preparations it would be the height of folly to be caught napping some day without weapons or ammunition of any value as against those with which modern science has equipped our foes. It is too late now to discuss the wisdom or folly of providing defences. That question has been settled long ago, and, in our opinion, very properly. Wffiat we have now to see to is that the defences which have cost us so much shall be rendered as complete and as thoroughly efficient as possible. And this must be placed beyond all reach of doubt and uncertainty. _____________