From the above remarks it may be gathered how badly the officers, to whom was entrusted the duty of studying the Japanese troops on the spot, carried out this duty; particularly faulty was their deduction regarding the inability of the senior officers to command in war.

After the war with China, which ended in the expulsion of the Japanese from the Liao-tung Peninsula and our occupation of Kuan-tung, they began to prepare in haste for war with us. From a little more than £2,000,000 in 1893, 1894, and 1895, their military Budget rose in 1896 to £7,300,000, in 1897 to £10,300,000, and in 1900 to £13,300,000. In 1902 all her preparations were apparently complete, and the Budget again fell to £7,500,000. Of the expenses incurred from 1896 to 1902 on increases to the forces, the War Department spent £4,800,000, and the Navy Department spent in nine years £13,800,000 [in building ships for the fleet]. It should be added that, while developing her forces, Japan was in other ways preparing for hostilities. A number of officers were sent to study their profession in Europe, including our own country, and the probable theatre of operations was investigated with great care, reconnaissances being organized in every direction. At great self-sacrifice also many officers were performing the most menial duties in our employ in the Far East in order to study our ways at a time when our military representatives in Japan were looking upon their nation with immense condescension!

As regards the organization of their forces, our information was sufficiently complete regarding everything which concerned the standing army; we also knew the number of depôt troops and the supposed dispositions of the territorial forces. But, while ourselves preparing to fight the Japanese with an army half composed of reserve troops, we never suspected that they, too, were organizing a great formation of reserve units, and that, owing to our slow concentration, they would be able to complete this formation. Amongst their reserve troops were men of all classes, and while our “second category” men constituted, according to our generals in the field, an element of particular weakness, their reserve soldiers, thanks to the patriotism and the martial spirit which permeated all ranks, fought not only no worse than their regulars, but in some cases better.[71] The appearance of their reserve units in the first battles was indeed a complete surprise for us. Nor did we properly appreciate the organization of their strong depôt units, which enabled every regiment of the standing army to have its depôt battalion, from which its wastage was uninterruptedly and quickly made good. Later, many of these battalions received extra companies, which brought them up to a strength of over 1,500 men, and some were moved into Manchuria and stationed close to the field troops. I fancy, also, that they were occasionally even used in the field—for instance, in protecting portions of positions which had been vacated by the field army—but their main function, that of repairing the wastage of men, was very successfully performed. The army possessed fewer battalions than we had, but they were kept up to strength even during a series of battles, and were usually superior in numbers to ours. Generally speaking, each Japanese battalion, taking the number of rifles, was equal to one and a half, and sometimes two and three, of ours. With us, on the contrary, the replacement of casualties was very fitful and unsatisfactory.

Though our information as to the material points of the enemy’s strength can hardly be described as good, we very much underestimated—if we did not entirely overlook—its moral side. We paid no attention to the fact that for many years the education of the Japanese people had been carried out in a martial spirit and on patriotic lines. We saw nothing in the educational methods of a country where the children in the elementary schools are taught to love their nation and to be heroes. The nation’s belief in and deep respect for the army, the individual’s willingness and pride in serving, the iron discipline maintained among all ranks, and the influence of the samurai spirit, escaped our notice, while we attached no importance to the intense feeling of resentment that we aroused when we deprived the Japanese of the fruits of their victories in China. We never recognized how vital the Korean question was to them, and that the “Young Japanese” party had long ago determined to fight us, and was only restrained by the wise action of their Government. True, when hostilities began we did see all these things, but it was too late. And at that time, when the war was neither popular with, nor understood by, our nation, the whole manhood of Japan was responding with unanimous enthusiasm to the call to arms. There were instances of mothers committing suicide when their sons were rejected for the army on medical grounds. A call for volunteers for a forlorn hope produced hundreds ready to face certain death. While many officers and men had their funeral rites performed before leaving for the front, to show their intention of dying for their country, those who were taken prisoners at the commencement of operations committed suicide. The one idea of the youth of Japan was to serve in the army, and all the great families tried to do something for their country either by giving their children to it or by providing money. This spirit produced regiments which hurled themselves upon our obstacles with a shout of “Banzai!” broke through them, and throwing the corpses of their comrades into the trous de loup,[72] climbed over them on to our works. The nation as well as the soldiers felt the vital importance of the war, appreciated the reasons for which it was being fought, and spared no sacrifices to obtain victory. In this and in the co-operation of the nation with the army and the Government lay the strength which brought Japan victory. And it was with an army weakened by the feeling of opposition in its own country that we had to face the armed might of such a nation!

While they had hundreds of secret as well as avowed agents studying our military and naval forces in the Far East, we entrusted the collection of information to one officer of the General Staff, and unfortunately our selection was bad. One of the so-called “Japanese experts” declared in Vladivostok before the war that we might count one Russian soldier as being as good as three Japanese. After the first few fights he modified his tone, and acknowledged that one Japanese soldier was as good as one Russian. A month later he affirmed that if we meant to win, we must put three men into the field for every Japanese! In May, 1904, one of our late military attachés at Tokio predicted, as an expert, that Port Arthur would very soon fall, and Vladivostok immediately after it. I reprimanded this cowardly babbler, and threatened to send him away from the front if he could not restrain his ill-timed and mischievous remarks.

After the Chino-Japanese War, which I had studied with great care, I, personally, was inspired with great respect for the Japanese army, and I watched its growth with considerable alarm. The behaviour of their troops which fought alongside ours in the Pei-chih-li province in 1900 only confirmed my opinion as to their value. In the short time I spent in Japan itself I was unable to get to know the country and its troops, but what I saw was sufficient to show me how astounding were the results attained by the Japanese in the previous twenty-five to thirty years. I saw a beautiful country filled with a numerous and industrious people. Great activity was visible on all sides, and underlying everything could be felt the national happy nature, love of country, and belief in the future. The system of education I witnessed in the Military School was of a Spartan nature, the physical exercises of the future officers being like nothing I had ever seen in Europe; it was really fighting of the fiercest kind. At the end of a bout with weapons the competitors got to hand grips, and fought till the winner had got his opponent down and could tear off his mask. The exercises themselves were performed with the greatest possible keenness and determination, the men hitting one another with wild shouts; but the moment the combat was over or the signal to stop was given, the usual wooden, impassive expression again came over the faces of the combatants. In all the schools military exercises were very conspicuous, and the children and boys were greatly interested in them. Even their walks out were always enlivened by tactical tasks adapted to the localities; turning movements as well as surprise attacks were practised and performed at the double. The study of Japanese history in all the schools had strengthened the people’s love for their native land, and filled them with a deep-rooted conviction that it was invincible. Their successes in war were everywhere sung, the heroes of those campaigns continually extolled, and the children were taught that not one of Japan’s military enterprises had ever failed. In the small-arm factories I saw large quantities of rifles being turned out, and the work was carried on with rapidity, accuracy, and economy. In Kobe and Nagasaki I inspected the shipbuilding yards, in which the construction not only of ocean-going destroyers, but of armoured cruisers, was proceeding; everything was being done by Japanese workmen under their own foremen and engineers. The trade of the whole country was most splendidly and instructively represented at the Great Exhibition of Osaka, where there was a large collection of manufactured articles of every sort, including textiles and complicated instruments, such as grand-pianos, engines, and heavy ordnance. These were all made in Japan with Japanese labour, and mainly from Japanese materials, except in the case of raw cotton and iron, which were imported from China and Europe. Not less impressive than their progress in manufacture was the orderly and dignified demeanour of the Japanese who thronged the Exhibition. Agriculture was still carried on in a primitive manner, but it was very close. Though the soil was most carefully cultivated, the keen competition for every plot of ground, the struggle to make even the hills productive, and the general scarcity of food-stuffs in the country (despite the intensive culture), showed how crowded the population was becoming, and how vital the Korean question was for the whole nation. After ten days spent among the fisher class, I got an idea of the reverse side of Japan’s rapid development according to European ideals, and many were the complaints made to me of the heavy taxes, which had increased so rapidly of late, and of the great cost of all the necessaries of life.

I saw some of their troops on parade (Guards Division, two regiments of the 1st Division, several batteries, and two cavalry regiments). Nearly everything was excellent, and the men marched well, and looked like our yunkers but the poor quality of the horses was very noticeable. Even after such short acquaintance, many of the officers and men gave the impression of being fitted by training and knowledge of their profession to fill honourable posts in any army. Besides the War Minister (General Terauchi), whom I had known in 1896, when we were both attached to the 17th Army Corps at the great French manœuvres, I met Generals Yamagata, Oyama, Kodama, Fukushima, Nodzu, Hasegawa, Murata, Princes Fushima, Kanin, and others. I also met numerous leaders in other spheres of life, among whom were Ito, Katsura, and Kamimura, and, in spite of the sad war which has placed a barrier between two nations that seem created to be friends and allies, I still feel affectionately towards my Tokio acquaintances. I especially remember the intense love of country and devotion to the Sovereign which permeated all, and showed itself in their daily life. In the report made after my visit, I stated my opinion that the Japanese army was fully equal to the armies of Europe; that while one of our battalions on the defensive could hold two Japanese battalions, we would require to be twice as strong as they when attacking. The test of war has shown that I was correct. There were, of course, regrettable instances when the Japanese, with fewer battalions than were opposed to them, drove our troops from their positions; but this was due to bad leadership on our side, and to the inferior war-strength of our battalions. In the latter phases of the Battle of Mukden, for instance, some of our brigades[73] could muster little more than 1,000 rifles. To be superior to such a brigade the Japanese only needed two to three battalions.

Everything that I saw and studied concerning the country—its armed forces, and its work in the Far East—convinced me how necessary it was to come to a peaceful agreement with Japan, even at the expense of concessions which might at first sight appear to be derogatory to our national self-esteem. As already stated (in [Chapter V.]), I did not hesitate to recommend even the restoration of Kuan-tung and Port Arthur to China, and the sale of the southern branch of the Eastern Chinese Railway. I foresaw that a Japanese war would be most unpopular in Russia, and that, as the reasons for it would not be understood by the nation, it would find no support in national feeling, and I showed that the anti-Government party would take advantage of it to increase the disturbance in the interior. But even I did not give our enemy credit for the activity, bravery, and intense patriotism which they exhibited, and was, therefore, mistaken in the time I thought that such a struggle would last. We ought to have allowed three years for the land operations, owing to our very inferior railway communication, instead of the one and a half years estimated by me. We did less than the world expected of us, and the Japanese did more.

Major Emmanuel, of the German army, a lecturer at the Military Academy at Berlin, gives the following appreciation of the Japanese military forces in his work on the Russo-Japanese War:

“At the beginning of the war the Japanese possessed an army, organized and trained according to the German ideal, but carefully adapted to the national peculiarities. It was excellently armed, in a high state of efficiency, and was commanded by a splendidly trained corps of officers, worthy of the deepest respect. The fleet is, however, the vital necessity of the country, and every Japanese is a born sailor, and, thanks to his intelligence and the practice he gets, handles the most modern ships admirably. Having adapted modern methods to her national idiosyncrasies, Japan has put in the field an army without nerves, and one that thoroughly understands the conditions of modern war. To great natural intelligence and aptitude for learning the Japanese soldier adds dash, a contempt for death, and a preference for the attack.”