WAR NOTES

Taihape Daily Times, Issue 220, 4 October 1917, Page 5

WAR NOTES

UNTRAINED RUSSIAN SOLDIERS. The recent Russian failure on the south-western front is discussed by the correspondent of the Morning Post. He writes: —"What precisely is the condition of the men in uniform in the war zone outsiders cannot pretend to know or understand. Indeed, it has puzzled experienced officers who have seen warfare in many lands to appreciate justly the significance of the unprecedented phenomenon of the general exodus from the front, described in my previous despatches. If a civilian may venture an opinion based on some knowledge of the nature of the Russian generally I should affirm that these very ignorant, uncultured masses, having no real ideas of their own on the subjects dealt with by political speakers during the past five months, are quite likely to become soldiers again when a reversion is made to the proper methods of teaching, namely, not words, but deeds. Hundreds of thousands, of course, will not respond to any, even the most drastic, forms of treatment, for the simple reason that during the past five months of absolute sloth they have not learned the most elementary technical busiMss of soldiering. There Were whole units who, so far from being able to shoot, did not even know hoW to load a rifle. But among the hiany millions Russia has at the front, plenty of trained soldiers are there, and soldierly treatment of these men will very soon turn them into the same "braves that we have been accustomed to hear about during the first two and a-half years of this war."