MORE MEN WANTED

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2591, 13 October 1915, Page 4

MORE MEN WANTED

The announcement made in the House of Representatives last evening by the Minister of Defence that the Army Council had asked for still more men from New Zealand will surprise_no one who has followed the course of events at the seats of war. Our heavy casualties pla'inly foreshadowed this for some time past, and the situation in the Balkans, and, more recently j tho latest movement of the _ Austro-German troops against Serbia, also, pointed emphatically in the same direction. We might have anticipated this call, but as we did not do so the next best thing is to find thafc the"Government has promptly made up its mind to iu -l • ■ £ e( l} les k of the Home authonties. It is not quite clear from Mr. Allen s statement what the Government intends to do beyond the increase of our monthly quota of Reinforcements from the existing 15 per cent, to 20 per cent. Apparently the Army_ Council suggested a further

additional 10 per cent, as a special emergency reserve, and this Ministers have not vet- made up their minds about. The pleasing feature, however, about the Minister's announcement last evening is that despite his constant assertions that we ire unable to train more men, he is yet undertaking to do so, and wo have no doubt that when ho sets himself to the task lie will succeed. It' is equally gratifying to learn that he has dccided, in part at least, to meet the demand that men when they havo cnce enlisted shall bo put into camp as quickly as possible. He still objects to preparatory camps, and no doubt this objection is sound enough from the military point of view. But it is not only the military point of view_ he and the Government have to consider. They have first of all. to onsure that their methods will induce tho men to come forward: thore is the human factor as well as 1 the military point of view to be considered. So long as recruits are not discouraged by long waits it is, we believe, preferable that they should go into the permanent draining camps for the whole of their, training ; it is only bccause recruits have been kept too Jong on the waiting list, and a dampener thus put on tho recruiting movement that we, amongst others, havo suggested preparatory camps as a remedy, and as likely to provide a probable . stimulus to recruiting. The change now to bo introduced by the Defence Department' of dispatch-

ing Reinforcements monthly instead of 'every two months, should to some extent minimise the drawbacks of

tho existing system, and will, we trust, have a good effect on recruiting. It is a considerable advance in tho right direction, and we congratulate the Minister both on the step taken and on overcoming the shipping transport difficulties to enable it to he given effect to,