The above memorandum, with the Tsar’s remarks on it, was sent to the War Minister for his guidance; but General Sakharoff either did not carry out some of the important recommendations I had emphasized most, or altered them, and carried them out too late. As regards the date of mobilizing the reinforcements, he did not share my view (1) as to the necessity for a simultaneous mobilization, and (2) as to the necessity for mobilizing immediately after Easter. In a memorandum drawn up by him, dated March 18, 1904, he asked permission to mobilize the reinforcements in three lots instead of at once. Six Cossack regiments were first of all detailed for mobilization in the end of April, then the 10th Army Corps on May 1, the 17th Army Corps on May 1 or a little later, and four reserve divisions of the Kazan Military District at the end of June. In a second memorandum (July 31) the question was again raised whether all the reinforcements should be mobilized simultaneously or at different times. The Headquarter Staff preferred the latter alternative. Besides the poor carrying capacity of the Siberian Railway, the reason given was that—
“... The political horizon might become so clouded as to make the simultaneous mobilization of all the troops mentioned in the statement inadvisable.”
Against this part of the memorandum I wrote the words, “It would be better to do it simultaneously.” On my way to the front I received a telegram from General Sakharoff, dated March 21, in which he said that my request for the troops guarding the line to Harbin to be supplied from one of the divisions of the Kazan Military District, and for this division to be mobilized together with the other reinforcing troops directly after the Easter holidays, could not be acceded to, owing to the inconvenience to which the people of that district would be put by so early a mobilization. He suggested that guards for the railway might be found from one of the divisions of the 4th Siberian Corps—in other words, that this corps should be broken up. The result of the reinforcements being mobilized at different dates, contrary to my wishes, was that when the leading units reached the front, they had not settled down properly; the men did not know their officers, and vice versâ. Few corps had been able to do a musketry course, the 2nd Category reservists did not know the rifle, and hardly any had been tactically exercised, or if they had, it had been only for a few days. Divisions and corps had not been practised with the three arms. The 6th Siberian Corps was mobilized under fairly favourable circumstances, the 55th and 72nd Infantry Divisions being sent into camp in 1904, but these divisions were trained without artillery or cavalry.[85]
In former days troops had to make long marches in full field-service order before they reached the battle-field. If properly conducted, these marches hardened the men, and enabled units to settle down; all superfluous baggage was discarded, the weaker men were left behind, and officers and men got to know one another. But nowadays, with railway transport, the results are very different. Going to the Far East, our men were crowded up in railway carriages for as long as forty days at a time, out of the control of their officers, who were in different compartments. In the old and well-disciplined units no particular harm resulted, but in the case of newly formed units, whose reservists—particularly those of the 2nd Category, just summoned from their homes—consisting of peasants and town-bred men, were all in carriages together, instead of with regulars, it was most harmful. If to this fact be added their original unwillingness to go to the front, their lack of military spirit, and the frame of mind induced by the seditious proclamations with which they were lavishly supplied, the small fighting value of these reinforcements can be easily imagined. Many commanding officers of such regiments told me that not only did they not know the men under them, but that, in spite of a journey of from forty to fifty days, even the company commanders had not got to know their companies.
The command of the various units of the field army was in a bad enough way, for, owing to the numerous changes in the staff, there were many newly appointed commanding officers; but among the reserve troops the case was worse, for almost all the commanders were fresh men. The value of even the regular units was still further diminished by the proportion and class of the reservists joining. For instance, in some companies of the 10th Army Corps there were only sixty regulars, of whom thirty were young soldiers who had hardly finished their recruits’ course; when 150 reservists from the Poltava province were added to this nucleus—all of them old men—a company lost almost all semblance of a regular one. The spirit of the Poltava reservists was at first specially bad, for a number of these men had taken part in the agrarian disturbances. Can it be wondered at that, in such circumstances, reinforcements which arrived from European Russia, and went into action straight from the train, were not so useful as they would have been had proper pains been taken with them?
What, then, were the motives which induced the War Minister (General Sakharoff) to act in this important matter contrary to the recommendations I had made, both as War Minister in 1903 and as Officer Commanding the Manchurian Army in 1904? In a memorandum written by him on March 18, after explaining his views as to the number of days which he considered the 10th and 17th Corps would take on their journey to the front, he stated that if the reserve units were mobilized in the middle of April, at the same time as the ordinary units, as I had asked, they would have to wait an unnecessarily long time before being despatched, and that it would be sufficient if reserve units,
“... having finished their mobilization, had two or three weeks for field exercises…. The units mobilized at the beginning of April would have to wait some three and a half months before being despatched. This, besides taking the men away prematurely from their spring work in the fields, would put the War Department to great and unnecessary expense in maintaining some 60,000 men. Mobilized units, of course, do not require so long to settle down.”
Thus, in spite of the importance of the matter, and of the fact that we could have trained well the men going to the Far East, my request was refused for financial reasons, and in order that men who were to be soldiers should not be taken away at sowing-time! The grounds for General Sakharoff’s opinion that newly raised reserve units only required two or three weeks to shake down instead of three and a half months are not obvious. Did he not know that the three-line[86] rifle now in the possession of the army was quite new to the 2nd Category reservists?
The Easter holidays were early in 1904, coming on April 10. I had asked that the general mobilization of all reinforcements should be ordered immediately after the holidays—i.e., in the middle of April—but General Sakharoff fixed the date for a month later; thus the reservists of the 10th and 17th Corps received a month’s less training before their departure for the front than I had stipulated for. The actual dates of mobilization were: 10th and 17th Army Corps, May 1, 1904; 5th Siberians, June 14. The leading échelons[87] entrained as follows: 10th Army Corps, May 18, 1904; 17th Army Corps, June 14; 5th Siberians, July 12. Thus those of the 10th Corps only had ten days to complete mobilization and get ready. If from this number be deducted the days on which reviews were held, it can be seen that the leading units of this corps could neither have gone through the shortest musketry course, nor have carried out any tactical exercises, while the rest of the corps had only about two weeks for this important work. The leading échelons of the 17th Corps were in a similar plight. The first units of the 5th Siberians, which was formed of reserve divisions, had one month from the day mobilization was ordered till it entrained. If review days and the time taken to mobilize be deducted, only a fortnight was available for instruction and shaking down, and the whole experience of the war has shown that this is insufficient, especially for 2nd Category reservists. Had the troops of the 5th Siberians only been mobilized at the same time as the 10th and 17th Corps, its leading units would have had about two and a half months for this process of preparation. In these circumstances the efficiency of its regiments would have been higher in the first fights than they were in General Orloff’s column at Liao-yang. Another result of the postponed mobilization was that the first échelon of the 10th Army Corps (9th Division), which arrived at the front on June 30, was much below strength, especially as regards officers. Not only had the Poltava reservists not settled down with the regulars, but in some companies they almost came to blows with them after the first fights. The regulars reproached the reservists for leaving the ranks in action, to which the latter replied: “You are soldiers; it’s your job; we’re peasants.” Feeling between the two classes of men ran so high that they were with difficulty restrained from actually fighting. I should in justice add that these peasants, under the command of the able and gallant General Hershelman, became hardened soldiers, and in later battles fought most gallantly, especially at Mukden. Units of the 5th Siberian Corps reached the front with their men in much the same state, and in the first battles some regiments of this corps did not display the steadiness they should have done, but later on, especially at Mukden, the 51st and 54th Divisions fought splendidly.
Although we had a large number of reservists at our disposal, instead of mobilizing the youngest, in some districts we took men of all ages, while in others we did not discard the elderly men. Directly they arrived at the front it was noticed that the older reserve men were both physically and morally less reliable than the others. Indeed, according to their officers, they were an actual source of weakness instead of strength to the units they joined. Nearly all the men who left the ranks in action were 2nd Category reservists. Of course, there were splendid exceptions, but the one idea of the majority of these men was to get put on non-combatant duties on the line of communication, on transport work, or appointed as hospital orderlies, and after the first fights they were given their desire. Our peasants generally put on fat, grow beards, and lose their soldierly appearance when they get over thirty-five. Naturally, also, they find the discomforts of campaigning harder to bear than younger men. The “Little Russian” 2nd Category reservists of the Poltava province were too heavy to scramble over steep slopes, and found the Manchurian hills very difficult to negotiate after the plains of their native country. The small active hillmen of Japan had indeed a great advantage over our soldiers in the July and August battles. It must also be remembered that villagers of over thirty-five are generally married men with large families. Our reservists were continually thinking of the homes and families they had left behind, which was not exactly conducive to the cheerful mind so necessary to the soldier. Added to all this, they did not understand the reason for the war, and far from being urged on by their country to deeds of gallantry, were fed with seditious proclamations, advising them to kill their officers instead of fighting. During the retreat from Mukden several units retired in disorder, and many men were met who had thrown away their rifles. One of these was heard by my staff to ask: “Where is the road to Russia?” On being told he was a cowardly cur, he answered: “Why should I have to fight? I have got six children to support.”