RUSSIA’S WEAKNESS.

Temuka Leader, Issue 1735, 10 May 1888, Page 3

RUSSIA’S WEAKNESS.

The Broad Arrow says:—Officers of the British army may look, and do look, with complacency upon a possible war between Austro-Germany and Eussia. We may cite as an example the words of an officer of high rank, who, speaking, in the course of an interview, laid great stress upon what. he called “ Russia’s suicide.” “The Czar,” he says, “lives in a fool’s paradise, He is not a soldier, although he commanded an army in the field. He is all but ignorant of the character of the Imperial forces, notwithstanding that he is Emperor, and their titular head. The Russian army is without scientific equipment or organisation, and it is practically without a general competent to direct its operations in a great war.” Proceeding the gallant critic said, “ I do not believe there will be a war of the kind which is frightening the Bourses, and bewildering Lord Salisbury, But if it came we might well rejoice. Russia would be worsted, her armies shattered, and her limits strangely converted to her disadvantage. Poland and Bulgaria would be torn from her influence; for the first time for centuries almost there would be no Eastern question, with the Sultan quaking in his slippers; and finally, and of most interest to us in England, there would come to an end, certainly for a generation—perhaps for ever—to the periodical scare over the Afghan frontier, and the invasion of Russia.” There is no doubt that a disastrous Russian campaign would seriously affect Russia’s designs in Central Asia, if indeed it did not lead to a successful revolt of the khanates.