THE HUMAN TOLL.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 251, 1 April 1915, Page 3

THE HUMAN TOLL.

BRITISH LOSSES.

SIX MONTHS' TOTAL, 104,000.

London, February 12.

During the first six months of_the war —up to February 4, that is—the total casualties of the British Expeditionary Force were approximately 104,000 of all ranks. So said Mr. Asquith in replying to a query, put by a Liberal member in the House of Commons last Monday. and Mr. Tenant, the Under-Secretary for War, Btates that the Premier's 'estimate included men who wore "missing" or had been made prisoners of war. Mr. Asquith was careful to state that the casualties were only those which had occurred in the western area of the war, but he did not make it clear whether the 104,000 included the losses sus • tained by the oversea contingents which have heen assisting the Expeditionary Force proper. If the total given is inclusive, then our losses, grievous as they are, have not been nearly so great as many people presumably qualified to form an opinion on the point had led us to anticipate. And in looking at the figures given, we must bear in mind the fact that a very large proportion of our wounded received injuries which only incapacitate them for a brief period. It is, indeed, stated that abou; CO per cent, of the wounded up to dafe have been able to return to the fronts and the death-rate among the wounded is said to be very low. No figure has

been given, as regards the British wounded, but some time ago a French newspaper gave some returns which showed that at a certain base hospital less than 5 per cent, of the soldiers brought in for treatment succumbed to their wounds.

A good many people have expressed surprise that the Government should see fit to publish these figures, while, so much of apparently less significance is concealed on grounds of military policy. Yet the publication is reasonable enough. It tells the nation something it lias desired very urgently to know, without disclosing to fie enemy anything worth his knowing, and there Is no reason to "believe that the Prime Minister's statement will have any adverse effects upon recruiting. As regards the objection made in some quarters to the publication of our casualties because it gives the information regarding our troops which our French friends withhold regarding theirs, it may b e pointed out that Great Britain is fighting with a force recruited by' voluntary enlistment, the actual numbers of which at the present moment are carefully concealed, so the proportion that our casualties 'bear to the mass I of men now under arms and in the field remains a matter of guesswork to the enemy. With the French it is different. The Germans, with their own experience to guide them, might vevv well be able to make a fairly accurate estimate on the basis of known statistics, of how many men ought, under a system of national service, to come into the field ultimately. For this reason—there may be others —the French military authorities make no ■statements of total casualties, nor, so far as \vq are aware, do the Russians. German casualty lists arc printed, and appalling losses are presented in them. The latest, issued less than a week ago, brings the Prussian losses alone up to 953,000. killed, wounded and missing. But these are not as Mr. Asquith's figures are, total casualties to a given date, and though we must exercise caution in accepting the daily tales of Germany's "appalling losses" in the eastern theatre ; with which imaginative scribes in Pelrograd and elsewhere furnish the English papers —45,000 killed was alleged to be the price Germany paid in one Imttle—it is quite certain that the German total losses to date in killed, wounded and missing cannot be less than two millions.