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warlike stores upon a distant land to postpone the provision of the requisite materiel of war until the moment of action arrives. lll.—Organization, Instruction, Training, and Equipment. Reconstruction necessary. A. Organization. —The organization of the troops proposed for allotment to the Garrison Force requires little change. In order, however, to make the Field Force effective very considerable organization and partial reconstruction of some portion of the existing forces available will be necessary. It is, moreover, obvious that all regiments of light horse, batteries of field artillery, and infantry must be made similar in strength, and that the peace and war establishments for all branches of the Force must be fixed. The creation or development of the departments which deal with transport and supply, with equipment, and with the care of sick and wounded, will have to be undertaken. These changes will entail comparatively small expense, and can be effected gradually. Every care should be taken to make the organization capable of expansion, and to base it upon a territorial system. Instruction of officers and of staff. B. Instruction of Officers and Staff. —The first essential of a citizen or militia army must be the training of the officers and staff. The better and more intelligent the troops the better trained and more experienced must be those who lead. A satisfactory standard of knowledge and proficiency can only in peace be effected by instituting Schools of Instruction for militia and Volunteer officers of all branches of the service, and by despatching selected officers to England and to India to attend special courses. Sufficient pay must be allowed as compensation to officers who thus devote their time to their own instruction for the benefit of the State, and a bonus upon passing periodical test examinations should be granted. A system of special instruction for staff officers should be instituted, of which a prominent factor will be " staff rides upon field-service conditions." The'expense of the foregoing need be small in comparison with its importance. School of Instruction. Sydney and Melbourne should form the centres respectively of the system of Schools of Instruction ; the former for the States of New South Wales and Queensland, and the latter for Victoria, Tasmania, South Australia, and Western Australia. Every facility exists in Sydney for the Schools of Instruction, which already exist in a limited form, together with the instructional troops required. A similar system should be created at Melbourne. Schools should also be formed as a part of this system in other centres, and at suitable times, so as to meet the local conditions. Military College. I trust that the establishment of a Military College may at no distant date receive the favourable consideration of the Government. An adaptation of the system of organization and of instruction carried out at West Point, in the United States of America, at the Eoyal Military College of Canada (Kingston, Ontario), and at the great public schools of England, would meet the requirements of such a college in Australia. A college thus created would be likely to give the most valuable results, not only in furnishing a high standard of education in the technical professions of civil life, but in inculcating those principles of military science which were found to produce men possessing such eminent military qualities in the great War of Secession in America, and more recently in the case of the Military College of Canada during the campaign in South Africa. I would recommend that, as part of such a college, there should be a special branch which would undertake the training of Australian officers in staff duties. The personnel of the College, and the instructional arrangements of the same, would be available for this further and more advanced course of military instruction, which is so essential for placing the professional knowledge of the officers of the General Staff in Australia on the requisite high level of military efficiency. Training of the troops. C. Training. —Secondary only to the instruction of officers is the training of the men. This, to be effective, must rather be constant each year than long in duration. Sixteen days per annum for light horse, infantry, and departments, and twenty days for artillery and engineers, should be sufficient if properly and efficiently administered. This training should be carried out in two categories—one for the troops raised in the country districts, which should mainly be for a given period in camps of instruction, at whatever time of the year may be most convenient to the industries followed by the men, and one for the troops raised in the cities and towns, whose employments do not admit of long absence, which should be, as at present, spread over the year by afternoon and evening training, with a short camp of instruction for three or four days at Easter, or during public holidays. Equipment required. D. Equipment. —The existing equipment of the troops to be allotted to the Garrison Force may be deemed sufficient for the purposes of such troops. The equipment, however, which is available for the Field Force leaves much to be desired. There is in all the States a complete absence of any modern infantry equipment, and only a small percentage of magazine rifles are available. The equipment of the mounted troops is equally incomplete, and only a small and

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