MILITARY SNOBS.

Colonist, Volume LVII, Issue 13774, 11 May 1915, Page 8

MILITARY SNOBS.

(From the 'London correspondent of the Dunedin "Star.")

There are office*- and officers, and though, fortunately, most of our British officers are endowed with commonsense, and know how to treat thenmen, "there are others," who look upon and treat the private soldier as a being wholly unfit for courteous treatment, and who take every possible means of impressing upon their raen that an officer is fashioned of -quite a different kind of c-lay to a mere "Tommy." Here, for instance, is an "instruction" issued by tho Lien ten-ant-Colonel commanding the 2nd reeerve. of the sth Warwickshire Regiment:— "N.C.O.'s should ren: ember ;that in a battalion there are three' separate and distinct class w. (1) Officers; (2) N.C.O.'s.; (3) privates. The distinction between N.C.O.'s a.nd privates should be as marked as between any other two, classes.

"No N.C.O. should ever walk out with a private; he should never drink with a^pi'ivate, and, so far as possible, he should never enter a bar v/nc-ve a private is, arid should a priva'.e come into a bar where N.C.O.'k are, they should leave as soon as possible, and not expect a private to do so. In view of the fact that at this station there •priH b& difficulty in the sergeant;;, corporals, and lance-corporals finding separate accommodation, it L> necessary that they should use the same part of the premises, separate iYoni that used by privates."

One wonders what-would happen if, say, the men of an Australian or New Zealand regiment * came face to face with such a notice signed by their commanding officer! It is hardly possible to conceive an order more likely to produce a most damaging effect upon the relations between officers and men. Here we have the commanding officer of a regiment insisting upon his junior officers and non-coms, "keeping Tommy in his proper place," and emphasising by their attitude towards him his terrible inferiority as a soldier and a man. Just contrast this commander's in-, stfuctions with the following extract from the Discipline Code of the Japanese, Army: — "Superiors must not be proud and haughty towards those of lower rank. They must treat those beneath them with kindness'and'special clemency, 'so' that all may unite as one man in the cause of their country." As to the wisdom of the Japanese rode, this only needs to be said: Throughout the whole of ...tlio .late KiH.so-Japsjr-- • war only *>r«' -S.»-»----w soldier was tried by court-martial/

whilst the discipline and devotion of the men set an example- to the world. The great '-..iijrriu- <>i' livitish officers . have coin u Ui '.■Divj^iise ih-.- fact that courtesy <iiui fcind'y com-.'. '■ • '-Jon towards LhoM^i <rf intVri.'v r■ i: is good for tli- Army, a'al pu.v-, '■. '.'icro are, it aMj'.M-s, snmo v.-i.t, would like to maki .-okiiering a r;i-ii-,o) for snobbery.