RUSSIAN WAR PROSPECTS.

Timaru Herald, Volume XXVII, Issue 1897, 28 November 1877, Page 3

RUSSIAN WAR PROSPECTS.

(Mail, September 28.) The Russian people no longer need to be warned that they must strain all theresources of their Empire if they ' -would come out of this war, not merely with, honor, but without disgrace. They already feel the pinch of financial adversity, and, their journals are busily discussing how the Government can most easily obtain the large amount of gold and silver requisite for the payment of its foreign creditors. Some enthusiasts have suggested that people who have brokenor superfluous articles of silver should send them to the mint to be coined ; but more prosaic minds are seriously discussing the necessity of raising another foreign loan. In the centres of Russian intelligence there seems to be a general conviction that Russia must prepare for a second campaign ; and a Moscow journal, which represents the more fervid states of opinion, loftily suggests that the army m the field must be raised to 650,000 men. Natu.ally, also, the disasters m Bulgaria are the theme of profound wonder, disappointment, and anger. Nobody imagined that the Turks were so well armed, so well led, so clearly a match for the best troops of Russia even m the open field. The war was begun with a vague idea that, after some hard fighting, the Turks would beg for peace, or be driven back to Constantinople. , The Russians find that they have been profoundly mistaken. The effects of the discovery are not unlike those produced m France when it was seen that the Germans could defeat the troops of the " Of-rpnde ' Nation," and that Berlin was terribly far off, Tf the Russians do not say. .f. We are betrayed," they complain that they have been misinformed by people who were bound to tell them the truth;, and they pay this country the compliment of feeling sure that Turkey is largely indebted for her victories to the direct aid of Englishmen. Such is . the talk m the great towns. What . the peasants think or say nobody . can tell, for between them and the educated classes, as our St. Petersburg correspondent warns the public, there is, a gulf which has not yet been bridged. Tlie peasantry, although the vast majority of the people, are still a mystery even to the agitators who speak m their name ; but they have never yet failed to display a wonderful power of silent obedience m the face of what more pampered classes might suppose to be overwhelming calamity. Nor do we hear of any agitation for peace m the .more educated. and powerful grades of society. The upper and the middle ranks may generally wish that the war had been at least delayed, and St. Petersburg may be much less zealous than Moscow ; but the general and earnest conviction would seem to be that the work must be carried on to the end, whatever may be the cost. SuchVa resolution might be changed by a few crushing defeats, or by an opportunity of escaping from the contest with some slight gains ; but we see no signs of auch a temper at the present time. The views of the educated classes are well expressed, perhaps, m the words spoken by Prince Tcherkasski. He complained that, m these days of.inatanfc publicity, people are too much, lea 1 away by the incidents of the hour, -and do not look sufficiently to the general course of events. Hence the educated Russians are discouraged because their armies have no great Generals, and have been disastrously baffled at Plevna. But he is frank enough to say that Russia has nevar had a great General since the rtime of Suwarrow, and he recalls the fact that m 1828-9 it cost her two terribly destructive campaigns to fight her way to Adrianople. If, he adds, . she was .prepared before the Danube was crossed, to spend 30,000 men m forcing a passage, why should she be discouraged now, when she has, . at a cost of 18,000 men, gained a central position between three Turkish armies? r Prince Tcherkasski is not at all uneasy. He has no fears about the final result- '■. But the position is somewhat darker than he makes it out to be. It is not. true. that Russia, has had no great Generals since the time of Suwarrow, for fifty years ago she had m Paskiewitsch and Diebitsch two leaders who would now be worth a reinforcement of a. hundred thousand men. The alarming fact ib that the military skill of Russia seems to have fallen off, although the atmosphere of her public life is military. ■' She also shows a far greater tendency than m past times to keep the highest posts of command within , the narrow circle of the Imperial family. No such fault was committed m her great wars with Napoleon or m her former contests with Turkey. It will be suggested i that the Princes of the reigning House

monopolise thechief places m order to show that, even iv the days of Democratic aspiration, they are the only leaders of the people. It is a noble aspiration if worthily directed ; but it is also a dangerous ambition m the absence of except'onal gifts ; and m this case it has failed disastrously. The princes have shown no capacity beyond what might serve a General of Brigade m quiet times, and none of them have given the slightest proofs of ability to handle great masses of men. Nor is the worst part of the mischief summed up m their positive errors. By keeping all the power m their own hands, th'^y have, it would seem, stunted the growth of such military capacity as Russia can furnish. There is. reason to believe that the nation has not yet recovered from the paralyzing effect left by the iron rule of Nicholas, who hated all forms of mental independence with a fervor to which there are few parallels m the history even of [denpot : sm. Before his time the nobles were often turbulent, and the Army had sometimes formidable political tendencies. But he crushed every form of mental freedom, until his Empire became a vast and silent drill-ground. It takes a long time for a nation like Russia to recover from such a process of intollectual starvation, and one bad effect of it survives m the monopoly of the highest military positions by the members of the Imperial family. Thus the Army has not been sufficiently made the training school which it must become m those days of scientific warfare if it would be other than an instrument of purposeless butchery. Tlieso facts are the theme of bitter comment m Russian society, and they will bear political fruit after the war. Just as the disasters of tho Crimea hastened the emancipation of the serfs, so will the flagrant blunders of the Imperial leaders m Bulgaria strengthen that demand for organic reform which is powerful even m autocratic Russia. Her educated classes are teachable, and we must do tho Government the justice of admitting that m recent years it has also been eager to profit by the lessons of the West. But the war must be brought to an end before the Russians can address themselves to the task of domestic reform, and they will find the work m Bulgaria extraordinarily difficult. At the same time they have, as Prince Tcherasski says, "one miraculous quality, called patience." They have "patiently borne all kinds of things — tho Mongol domination, Ivan the Terrible, serfage." He tliinks that they will bear this war too. Perhaps they will ; but it must not be forgotten that some of their patience may have been the result of an ignorance which is rapidly lessening, and of an isolation which has disappeared. ■ They have certainly one consolation m the state of all Europe beyond their own frontiers. No Government proposes to aid Turkey, and the greatest of the military Powers is openly eager that Russia : should be successful. Even the Poles have been peculiarly quiescent m spite of the many incitements they have received to harass Russia by an insurrection. A letter from "A Pole," which we publish m another column, explains their peacefulness by a theory which does credit to their ingenuity. Germany, he siiys, would be glad to see an insurrection m Poland, because she would send her troops to stamp it out, and' would then keep what territory she had subdued. That Berlin covets a new boundary line m Polish territory is i»n old story, and, if the Poles believe that Russia might yield it m leturn for German help m Bulgaria, no harm will be done so long as they : themselves do not spread the area of disturbance. ' In Russia that fantastic '^theory of Prussian ambition will be encouraging rather than otherwise, as a further sign of the general belief that Germany would be profoundly unwilling to let her northern ally be humiliated.