Impressions of a War Correspondent

by George Lynch

Boer Shell Bursting Among The Lancers At Rietfontein.

At night, in the camps on the way up, what I had mistaken for some Buddhist evening prayer, when the soldiers tramped round like a human prayer-wheel, was, I subsequently discovered, the chanting of a war-song which had been composed by General Fukushima himself.

The interesting thing to observe will be to see how the Japanese behave when they are getting the worst of it, how they will conduct themselves when they are outnumbered, or when under the strain of a losing fight. From a sporting standpoint, I'll be inclined to lay six to four on a Japanese against a Russian regiment. I met some people on the way to Pekin who regarded the Russians as the best war soldiers of the lot. The Russians were intensely like the preconceived idea one is inclined to form of Russians. Solid, deep-chested, heavy and hardy, they gave one the idea of big, heavy farm labourers with a rifle instead of a spade upon their shoulders. They never moved with anything like the quickness which characterised the Japanese, yet they plodded on with a dour stubbornness which gave the impression that if their movements were not quick, they represented a weighty momentum difficult to arrest. Although uncouth, and frequently savage in their behaviour, they yielded a child-like, or almost slavish, obedience to their officers, and on these officers should lie the blame of the innumerable outrages committed by them, from which they might have been restrained if kept properly under control.

Of the many tips which one force got from another, the Russians had an admirable system of carrying with them on the march a sort of locomotive kitchen, which consisted of a huge cauldron underneath which was a coal fire. The contents of the cauldron, which appeared to be the Russian equivalent for Irish stew, were hot and ready for the men at any halt in the march. How delightful such an institution would have been to Tommy in the miserably cold hours between two and four o'clock on the veldt of a South African morning!

As regards the French force on the expedition to Pekin, in discipline and in equipment and the conduct of the men composing it, it was absolutely beneath contempt. Unless the art of foraging and looting can be considered soldier-like qualities, they appeared to me to lack every one.

I looked forward to seeing great things from the Germans. But I must say that I was immensely disappointed. As far as parade-ground drill was concerned they were admirable; as the mechanical and automatic resultants of the efforts of the drill-sergeant they were possibly unequalled. But they appeared to be heavy and slow in their movements. On one little expedition outside Pekin for the purpose of surrounding a body of Boxers, which was undertaken by a combined force of British, Americans, Japanese, and Germans, the encircling movement proved a failure owing to the Germans arriving an hour late at their appointed position. Discussing the Germans one day with a Japanese officer, his criticism on them was, "Very good soldiers, but I tink too much drill drill."

If the Germans suffer from too much mechanical "drill drill," the Americans certainly suffer from the opposite. Self-reliance, independence, and individuality of action are all very desirable qualities, but the Americans suffer immensely from the want of discipline and drill. Perhaps the democratic feeling of the States does not lend itself so easily to discipline. Each one of Napoleon's soldiers was supposed to carry a marshal's bâton in his knapsack. The American soldier has taken it therefrom, and is rather inclined to be a marshal unto himself, thinks himself quite as good as his superior officer, if not better, and, more than any other soldier, is given to grumbling, and spends a lot of his attention, which should be concentrated on merely obeying, to expressing his individual opinion. The United States soldiers are far and away the best fed in the world. Their standard of comfort, not to say luxury, is immensely higher, and would be absolutely ruinous in an army the size of any of those of Europe.

Comparing the various forces—as I had an opportunity of observing them in China—with those of our own in South Africa, I am filled with a much higher idea of the latter than before I had such a standard of comparison. Our army, composed as it is in part of Colonial regiments, is now a combination of various admirable qualifications. The resourcefulness and individuality of action, which is the most admirable thing to be found in the American army, was quite equalled by men who composed such regiments as the Imperial Light Horse, the South African Horse, Brabant's Horse, the New Zealanders, and the Canadians.

The inspiring, ingrained fighting spirit of the Japs is to be found in the Irish regiments, who are probably the best fighting men in the world; the chivalrous gallantry of artillery in action, which Zola wrote of in La Débâcle, I saw in quivering vitality at Elandslaagte and Rietfontein, and not by the hastening of a step was the old tradition of our artillery (to go into action at a gallop and come out at a walk) forgotten in actions outside Ladysmith. Superior-speaking, long-range critics talk disparagingly of our soldiers in the Transvaal. Germans talk of how things should have been done, forgetting that the little expedition they sent out to China was kept waiting for a month at Tientsin before the men could start for Paoting-fu, owing to the non-arrival of some essentials of their equipment.

Far be it from me to think of posing as a military expert or a sort of composite military attaché to the allied forces. I speak merely as an observant outsider. In riding to hounds one soon learns the men one would select to ride against the pick of another pack. One feels in his "innards" the man he would like to go tiger-shooting with, although it would be another matter to put down his reasons in writing, and much more so with soldiers in the field.