MUST THE TERRITORIALS GO ?

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLV, Issue 13, 28 September 1910, Page 50

MUST THE TERRITORIALS GO ?

UhXIMIN, August 12. THREE vears ago our War Minister, Mr. Haldane, in his efforts to remodel the military services of the Old Country, swept away the old Volunteers. These were partially trained troops, numbering over 800.000 men, a very lair proportion of whom were, as the Boer War proved, at least quite equal in all the qualities that go to make a good soldier to the averagt regular, in >pitj of the fact that their training was by no means what it might have been. I'h.'v all did at least ten drills a year, and attended an annual inspe.dion, whilst a fair proportion wont to vamp for a week's annual training. By no stretch of imagination, however, could the \ olnnteer force, as a w hole, be looked upon as entirely -ati.-dying the needs of Home <lel'enc< in times of emergency. It might bav< i been made so had the authorities

given the Volunteers the encouragement and financial assistance they deserved, for the men w ere for the most part keen and most anxiou-. to make themselves something more than mere “soldiers for parade purposes. ’’ But the War Office authorities never at any time seemed to take the \ olunteers really seriously, and ji bct.'iuc quite clear some ten or twelve year-, ago that a plot was afoot in high military quarter" to bring about the serapping " of t he force. three \<*ar> ago Mr. llablane accomplished that task, lb 1 abolished the Volunteer". .ml in their place*, with many line words amt comforting as mrances, gave ii" the I erri t oriiri Army. this was I<) be at lej"t equal to the “ scrapped ” force numerically, much more efficient, completely orgaiiHed. and tit to defend the country against s t rious attack by the trained troops of any Continental Power. To day it look" uncommonly as though Mr. Haldane'" experiment, was doomed to prove a ghastly failure, The Territorial \rmy is short of the necrssiry numbers, and it "ee:ns hopeless to expect €in\ increase in those numbers, tor tin* force is rapidly losing whatever popularity it may have enjoyed. As for it** efficiency, it appears to be no greater than lh.it of the old Volunteers. The men of tin* I eri itorial force do just flic same number of drills a year before they go to camp. and tiny are the name old drills at tho-« imposed upon

the Volunteers. By no means all of the men can or will attend camp, and very few of them can. or will stay in camp for more than a week. So, as regards drill and camp, their training does no more tor them than did the training of the men they have superseded. As for the “complete organisation ” of the new force, that seems to be more or loss of a myth, if one may judge, of the difficulties experienced in mobilising the various divisions for the last annua! training. And the loud complaints of the mtn w ho have taken part therein regarding the commissariat and other departments are not likely to render the Territorials an attractive service to eligible youngsters. Labours have been imposed on men fresh from office work which even the highly trained regular troops have found severe; the bulliest of bully-beef and tinniest of tinned stuff* served out as rations and men have been needlessly subjected to serious privations and unnecessarily exposed to dangers and dis-

comforts detrimental to their health, and calculated to promote disgust with the Territorial service, not only among the men themselves, but among their employTlie result is that to-day we have a force depleted in numbers by comparison with the old Volunteers, and not one whit more efficient, though it is a much more expensive force. At the present lime, indeed, it looks as though the Territorial Army is destined to follow the Volunteers t » the scrap-heap, and that, some form of conscription for Home* defence must ensue if we are to get. a real Home defence army capable of taking the field against a trained enemy. TROOPS ASLEEP UNDER FIRE. What do you think of a battle in which "evenly live per cent of the combatants fell fa"t asleep while under lire? Thi«s was one of the incidents in tin* annual terrimrial manoeuvres which have ju-t come to an end. Soldiers have been known to fall asleep during an action in real warfare, but seventyfive is a percentage beyond the experience of even the most hara«<*d army. Act Mr. Pre\ost Bat tors by. a veteran war correspondeu. and a trained soldier, declare* this is what happened during a mimic battle in which the London territorials wen- engaged a few day* ago. Say a Mr. Battersby: “It would prob-

ably be no exaggeration to say 7 that at noon at least that proportion* (seventyfive per cent) of the mon who were fighting were fast asleep. They lay not as men lie who take sleep as a luxury,but as men *)eep on wlieii it is forced as a necessity, in angular, dislocated attitudes, which normally would make sleep impossible, looking—many of them —more like dead men than resting ones. Five minutes in the firing line under the friendly sun was enough for them. Their heads dropped on to their rifles and their senses into oblivion, the booming of the guns over their heads within a few yards of them failing even to stir their slumbers. Their support* dozed in torpid line* along the hedges; the reserves dreamed in blissful heaps beneath the trees.” This description refers to 'the Second London Division. It suggests very plainly that the physique of the men has not been equal to the strain of campaign practice. One difficulty in regard to the manoeuvre* has been the large number of withdrawals from camp after the first week. In some cases the employers were unable tr unwilling to grant more than a weeks leave of absence; in others, the men were unable to stand the strain of two weeks’ continuous training. Out of 12,031 men in camp at Bor-

don 4355 have stayed only one week—a percentage of 35. Still, the work on the whole appears to have given satisfaction. A war correspondent with the Firist London Division, who speaks with full experience of modern warfare in three continents, is of opinion that “the stiffening element” i* growing, that the proportion of mon who go away after one week's training because of physical inability to stand the strain is diminishing. and that tin* “fed-up* and coldfooters'* are a disappearing quantity. Report" from other parts of the country are not le«ss favourable upon these points, for there speins to be no lack of keenne-s or enthusiasm on the part of (he young men. There was one serious case of mutiny during the territorials’ manoeuvres. It occurred in the \Ve*t Riding Brigade in camp at Ramsey. Isle of Man. There had been a Hying march to North Barrule— Mie second highest mountain in the island -and the weather was detestable. The num had been out four or five hours and were wet through. When the brigade was on the mountain the ringleaders in the mutiny cried out, ‘•Come on, lads, let us gr, back,” and their lead was followed by nearly threescore mon, who have been described as “lad* who probably did not know anything of military discipline.” The man who knows nothing of the first and essential qualification of the soldier can have

no place even in a territorial army. That he should be found in a Yorkshire brigade is certainly astonishing. The ringleaders have been di*mi*sed, but the moral of the incident remains.