KITCHENER'S ARMY

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2455, 7 May 1915, Page 7

KITCHENER'S ARMY

* ITALIAN TRIBUTE TO ENGLAND OUR FORMIDABLE POWER The able correspondent of the "Giorliale d Italia" has always been a free and frank critic of things English, and cannot be accused of partiality. This is what he says of the new British Army;— Let Italians one© for all recognise the existence of a formidable English army. Sceptics by profession, if they do not believe the statements in newspapors, let them get into the train and come over here. A trip to London would teach them much; among other things, the way to build up the armed forces of a country in six months by means of social discipline and tho banknotes in the nation's coffers.

Ours is queer country. We arc all cousins of St. Thomas. Our incredulity is hypercritical, theoretical, founded 011 catchwords that have been bandied on about Italy for half a century. Nobody believes without seeing, but nobody wants to see, for fear of "changing.his bed and being woke up in the morning by a strange servant." So everyone stays at home and passes his leisure time in refusing to believe in any little good thing that may como from humanity outside of Italy. This —the English anny—is, an illuminating example. There is not a man in all Italy, from Cuneo to Girgenti, who can read a newspaper, who seriously believes in the existence of an English army a million strong. When Kitchener, Asquith, and other big men here propounded straightforwardly their theory of making an army in a few months, in the twenty thousand cafes of glorious Italy the news was taken as an excellent opportunity for irony; the millions of iNapoleonic strategists said that that sort of thing really would not go down in Italy; with the tenacity of mulluses from that day to this they have wrapped themselves up in .that certainty; all over the place it is repeated that Lord Kitchener's Army is a bluff oil par with the Kaiser's desire to have his dinner in Paris.

Authoritative journals have supported this, conviction; military critics of repute, comfortably settled at their desks, over a cigar and a cup of coffee, have allowed England possibly 300,000 men. The fiercest of them deny that there is any British Army at all; they speak of armed bands, organised on a sporting basis, something like the Albanians perhaps.

Perfectly Prepared. So there came nere the other day an officer of our General Staff, who, immediately on liis arrival, went about saying to the whole world: "Surely the English are not really giving out as true that humorous pronouncement of theirs about an army? . . . Our General Staff is convinced that to put 200,000 men in France is their limit. It seems that that officer's opinion had changed before he left London; the change was brought about by the force of facts, and much against his will. And if there is still disbelief, there is the report of the debate in the House of. Commons the other day, when it was stated by the, Prime Minister that "the British Army, from the beginning of the war till now, has lost 110,000 men."

Italians will not be so bigoted as to believe that the head of a Government would deliberately. exaggerate the nation's losses to help recruiting. But apart from these indisputable facts, whose value is rather of the past than of the future, it is. as well to make, here and riowj an explicit statement, and it is this: England has to-day perfectly prepared an army of more than a million men.

And I hasten to add that I base this statement on personal investigations carefully carried out, and rot on any assurances, of more or less value, of patriotic Englishmen. It is a fact that right up to the last days of autumn I set down in these columns my doubts about the complete realisation of Lord Kitchener's programme; it is a fact that during a flying visit to the field of battle I often wrote that in face of the amazing organisation of the German military system I had no great faith in this voluntary army improvised to support the awful hardships of a long and bloody war. To-day it is my duty and my pleasure to take back the doubts which then were allowable. I am absolutely convinced that England lias now ready to go into the fighting line '600,000 men, who in six months haveundergone a preparation intense, disciplined, and, above all, voluntary, which has fitted them in every way to meet effectively the German troops, with all their technical and moral strength. It is obvious that I cannot give documentary proof of these numbers, but it is a fact that they are there—6oo,ooo men. the flower of British manhood, enrolled between September 1 and to-day. I have seen these new soldiers of England, I have been in the midst of thorn, and I have studied them, m their barracks, on their . training grounds, and while off duty, and I have been frankly astonished at their excellence. Their discipline is of spirit Tather than of regulations; their keenness to go to the front is a sort of feverish pride taking its origin in the home rather than in the barracks; their moral tranquility is that of every class of Britons, coming from insensibility to danger and unexampled pride of- race: their physical preparation is that of sportnnen who take a pleasure in the exercise of muscle and nerve to win the day; their military preparation is individual, self-taught, so to speak, tho product of the seriousness and gravity with which the Englishman applies himself to anything as soon as he lias realised its necessity, their equipment is simple, convenient, perfected, better than that of the Germans. Like the Soldiers of Old.

I repeat, this conviction has been brought home, to me after a minute and at 'first sceptical investigation. I am one of those who think that military power cannot be improvised. One people alone could work this miracle; the people of England. Its power differs from the German; it comes from individual rather than collective discipline. Its ideals, as soon as the.y take shape, become practical. Its patriotism is puro instinct of self-preservation, measured by the egoism from which is originates. These six hundred thousand men will' fight iust like tho British soldiers of old who made the greatest Empire of the world.

I have not the desire or the ability to prophesy about the result of the struggle. One thing I can say: that a mistake is being made by any who ask with a sneer what technical value there can be in the officers or the contingent forces of this improvised army in front of the formidable preparation of Germany. Such forget that to-day, as a century ago, victory is not the slavo of tlm combatant who happens to ho materially and mechanically tho stronger, but of him who to win it is morally the best prepared; tho.y forget, too, that this arm.v lepresents a people extraordinarily different from any other in the world, a people rich beyond compare, and free in this emergency to use its wealth to any extent.

"Kverv foreigner who comes here and studies, merely superficially, (lie organisation of this new British army, is amazed hv the almost fantastic prodigality with which the preparation of tho soldier is being hastened. Tens and tens of millions are being spent every week .to strengthen the defence of the Emoire. Cannon, rifks, ammunition.

are poured out every day into tho barracks from hundreds of factories working day and night without stint of men or money. _ Thousands of pounds sterling are given every evening in pay to tlio army at a rate which seems absurd in comparison with European armies. JM-ery single thing, every detail, is thought of and found, to make the soldjer s life amid the hardships and trials oi the held of battle comfortable, even pleasant. Iho big workshops of England to-day are working for the army, and the army alone. I havo just had a short run to Birmingham and Sheffield, and I was appalled to see silver plate works manufacturing bayonets, artistic furniture works making ammunition boxes, ladies' dressmakers hard at work ou soldiers' uniforms. The whole of the marvellous wealth of the industry of the United Kingdom has been turned upsido down, transformed by tho phantasm of war: England's milliards are being poured out to-day in a stream of gold to make the glorious breastplate that will ensure victory.

"It is well that Italy should not be ignorant of this marvel, and should draw from it a moral lesson for the present and the future. The tremendous upheaval of a people, pouring out all the fruit of its wealth on a struggle beyond its borders, is the strongest proof of the invincible determination and tenacity of those who are charged with the destinies of England to-day."

But Signor Bedolo rather exaggerates the« "incredulity" of Italians. Selfstyled experts may write doubtfully about the British Anny, but the man in the street has grasped it and believes in it because he lias found from experience that Englishmen are worth believing. Moreover the bst of the military critics take it seriously indeed.