RUSSIA'S LAST HOPE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 8376, 24 July 1905, Page 2

RUSSIA'S LAST HOPE.

GENERAL LINIEVITCH.

(By ONE WHO KNOWS HIM.)

(Daily Mail.)

Kuropatkin, when he was given command of the Russian Army against Japan, had at least one enemy in his own ranks. General Linievitch, it is said, refused to serve under the new Commander, and was given a separate command at Vladivostock. To-day his enemy has succeeded him, and General Liuievitch. commands the Russian

forces,

General Linievitch (Nikolai Petrovitch) is an infantry officer, who has seen none of the big campaigns of tho last half of the nineteentJi century, but has had a great deal of experience corresponding to that which iintislx oJiicers get on the frontier of India in fciieir smaller expeditions. iv heigiit about olt 6in, his full face, were his chin shaven, lias often beeu compared tv txiac ox iuocd ltoberts, but in proiiie his distinctly Muscovitofcipped nooe spoils tho resemblance. He is in no way a powerful man to look at, but lean and of slight build] and apparently he has led a less rapid life tiian most llussian oiUcers. He was, in fact, one of the few officers of his force who could be said by a sportsman to bo "in good training."

HIS CONDUCT IN CHINA.

That he is dashing and brave is undoubted. General Stoussel could not bo induced to advance towards Pekin in July, 1900, but Linievitch, when he arrived, was disgusted at the delay, and concurred at once in th© views of the British, American and Japanese generals then at Tientsin.

Of the behaviour of the troops under Linieyitch's command en rout© to Pekin it is needless to say more than that they showed tho Chinese all the horrors of war. That Linievitch, in his despatches, is as little worthy of confidence as Kuropatkin, is shown by the fact that, after the battle of Yaugtsun, where the Russian casual ties, all tojd, did not exceed fifty, he telegraphed to the Czar, saying that he had lost five hundred killed and wounded, and much exaggerated th& altogether minor part played by his forces on that day.

At the assault on Pekin, on August 14, 1900, as his troops filed past him to the attack, he made an amazing speech to them, giving them license to behave like savages, and it was Linievitch, too, who, after having, at a conference of the allied generals, decided that August 13 should" be devoted to reconnaissance, August 14 to concentration, and August 15 to the assault on Pekin, tried to steal a march on his colleagues, and, by a rapid coup de main on the early morning of August ; 14, force his way into Pelclii and snatch the laurels from, those whom he had allowed to "bear the heat and burden of the day on the march up from Tientsin ; but he found the Chinese on the look-out for him, and was rather severely handled. THE GRAND LOOTER. When the triumphal march through the Forbidden City took place on August 28, 1900, General Linievitch, having previously agreed with the other generals that no war correspondents were to accompany the forces, gave them permission to do so after they had, in accordance with his own instructions, been refused this permission by the staff of their own country's forces, and his act gave rise to much unmerited complaint against tho British, general and his international colleagues.

A memorable incident took place about this time. At a ■conference of the allied generals, General Linievitch stated that he had 18,000 men in and around Pekin. whereupon bluff old general Chaffee', the gallant commander of tho American forces, clapped the table with his net, and said, "Well, that's, a darned lie, anyhow." This was interpreted to Linievitch, who knows no other language than his own, but h& merely said, " Da— da— da — da."

When the Summer Palace was occupied, General Linievitch and the superintendent of the Russian Red Crass Society (specially deputed by the Csar) stripped it of. practically everything worth talcing, and shortly after Linioviteh complained to everybody that he feared he was a ruined* man, because there was" some talk of levying Customs duties in Port Arthur on the loot he had shipped ! This, he complained, if exacted, would amount to so immense a sum that he would be hopelessly bankrupt. HIS RECORD. . General Linievitch. was not in any way personally concerned in the strained relations -which arose between Russia and Great Britain over the Tientsin railway station. This trouble really originated in land-grabbing and claimjumping operations, in which the Russian military agent had a pecuniary interest.

Linievitch i 6 anything but a young man. He is, indeed, nearly seventy years of age, Kuropatkin being his junior by ten years. He began liis soldier's life in the Crimean War, and was. conspicuous by his services in the Turk' ish War twenty years later. Once during that campaign he distinguished him' self greatly, in spite of severe wounds, by forcing the Turks to retire from a strong position. Linievitch served, too, in the Caucasus, and it was he who first led the Russian Army into Manchuria, He raised the first battalions of Siberian Sharpshooters, the nucleus of the Siberian Army Corps, and had command of the Russian troops at the relief of the Legations in China. It was from Linievitoh that the Czar received a telegram saying that his troops wore the first to enter Pekin, and one of the general's most precious possessions is a, message from his Sovereign congratulating him upon the "rapid occupation " of Pekin, and conferring upon him -the Order of St George. It is thought that the jealousies of the Russian generals, which have been the curse of Russia, since the war began, have been specially marked* between Kuropatkin and his successor.

CONTEMPT FOR THE JAPANESE

The general is a Russian rara avis. He is a good husband and father, a temperate man, a plucky, but by no means great general. Unless assisted by a most able staff, he would have no chance of beating a Japanese force on equal terms, much less in such a condition of inferiority as is now the cass. The Japanese will be delighted to beat him, because he treated them with, so much contempt in 1900, and invariably said that any debatable matter would be ' settled by the European generals,' "as if the\ Japanese were not civilised! Ho is beloved, it is true, by his men—that, is, by the troops from .Eastern,.Sibenaj but unless Russia can produce a .staff officer who is infinitely' abler than JNapoJeon and Von Moltke at their best, Linievitch has no more chance of gaming a serious victory within the next, :. twelve months than Rozjestvensky had of taking his fleet into Vladivostock.