Leaving the question of unpreparedness, he came to the great point, and asked what the Government intended to do.
“There is a paragraph in the Queen’s Speech which I rejoice to see, of a somewhat didactic character in its first sentence, but not without interest in its second. ‘The experience of a great war must necessarily afford lessons of the greatest importance to the military administration of the country. You will not, I am convinced, shrink from any outlay that may be required to place our defensive preparations on a level with the responsibilities which the possession of so great an Empire has laid on us.’ The noble Marquis made no reference to that paragraph, except to say that he does not think we shall see compulsory service in the life of the youngest peer present. I do not affirm or question that proposition, but I can say I do not think it is so immeasurably remote as the noble Marquis considers that some form of compulsory service may have to be introduced to meet the growing exigencies of the Empire. I am sure that neither from this nor from any other sacrifice will the nation recoil to preserve the predominance of our Empire. We have sent away from our island a vast mass of troops which usually garrison it. Situated as we are in the centre of a universe by no means friendly to us, that we should not have a hint from the First Minister of the Crown what military measures the Government propose to take in face of the disasters we have met with, and what sacrifices we must inevitably be called on to make to redress them, is one of the most extraordinary features of the working of the British Constitution on which the noble Marquis has laid such great stress. I agree with him in saying that the country will carry this thing through. It will carry it through in spite of all the impediments, both of men and of methods, that have shackled it in the past; but I venture to say that it will have to be inspired by a loftier tone and by a truer patriotism than we have heard from the Prime Minister to-night.”
Mr. Balfour, in the House of Commons, was as damping to popular hopes as the Prime Minister in the House of Lords. Regarding the all-important subject of the under-estimation of the Boer strength, he somewhat airily said:
“It will be asked, How comes it, then, that this great under-estimate of the Boer strength was made if we knew approximately what the Boer armaments were, and what Boers were likely to take the field? I do not know that I have got any very satisfactory answer to give to that question. It is a purely and strictly military problem, and, as history shows, it is a kind of problem very difficult to answer satisfactorily. You can gauge the military strength of a European nation with a fixed army, with all their modern military apparatus, and with all their military statistics at your disposal; but when you come to problems of States whose military organisation is not of that elaborate kind, great mistakes have been made in the past, and I doubt not great mistakes will be made in the future. They certainly have been made by almost every military nation of whom we have any record. But if this is regarded as an attack upon the military experts of the War Office, it is surely an unfair attack, because soldiers, who are not especially given to agreeing with one another, were absolutely unanimous upon this point. I do not believe you will be able to quote the opinion of a single soldier of any position whatever, or of no position, delivered before, say, July 31 or August 31 last, indicating any opinion which will show that the force which we in the first instance sent out would not be amply sufficient, or more than amply sufficient, for all purposes. (Cries of “What about Butler?”) The right hon. gentlemen put a question to me about Sir W. Butler. We had not the slightest trace at the War Office in any communication, public, semi-public, or private—no communication of any sort, kind, or description, which indicated that in Sir W. Butler’s opinion the force we sent out was not sufficient—I was going to say doubly sufficient—for any work that it might be called upon to perform.”
Indeed, the whole tenor of the speech was generally regarded as unsatisfactory and dispiriting. It was felt that, as Lord Rosebery expressed it, the Government must be left to “muddle through” somehow. People who hung anxiously on the lips of the Government for definite statements regarding future resolute action were disappointed, and waited wearily the conclusion of the debate.
On February 1, Sir Charles Dilke drew vigorous comparisons between the present and former campaigns. In regard to our lack of artillery he said:
“All our generals had told us that direct artillery fire had failed against the Boer entrenchments. It had been known for years past that direct artillery fire would be likely to fail against strong entrenchments; yet we sent twenty-one batteries of field-artillery to South Africa before the first one of the three howitzer batteries was despatched. It was one of the strongest charges which he and others had brought against the War Office for some years, that our army was more badly supplied with field-artillery than any other army in the world. It was not even comparable with the field-artillery of Switzerland and Roumania. In regard to our guns, the Leader of the House had stated in a speech at Manchester that we had guns in South Africa sufficient for three army corps of regular troops. He should like to know on whose authority the right hon. gentleman made that statement. The first force sent to South Africa from India was supplied with guns, not on that scale, but still in fairly decent and respectable measure. The forces of Lord Methuen and Sir Redvers Buller fell altogether short of even the scale adopted for the Indian Contingent. Both these generals had themselves called attention to their deficiency in this respect. We had not even now got artillery on anything like the scale laid down by the right hon. gentleman, and we could not have it in South Africa, because we had not got it in the world. In these circumstances he could only characterise the statement of the Leader of the House as entirely erroneous and misleading, and altogether a blunder. With regard to the batteries which were even now being sent out, many of them were manned by reservists and by garrison artillerymen, who had had no experience in the handling of modern field-guns.”
Proceeding to the question of lack of cavalry, he argued:
“With regard to cavalry as with regard to artillery, the first force was well supplied, but the forces of Lord Methuen and General Buller were very deficient in that respect. In that connection the First Lord had made an attack on the critics of the War Office. He said they had not seen, or if they had seen had not insisted on, a novel fact in the present war, namely, that for the first time in the history of the world they had seen an army composed entirely of mounted infantry. The right hon. gentleman had only to read Sir William Butler’s ‘Life of General Colley,’ where he would find very marked attention drawn to that matter. As to the Defence Committee of the Cabinet, of which the right hon. gentleman was a member, though he himself had been spoken of as the author of that body, he must admit that it had failed. It was instituted after a correspondence in which he himself, his hon. friend (Mr. Arnold Foster), and Mr. Spenser Wilkinson took part, and it was not new to the present Government. It was instituted in the time of Lord Rosebery’s Government as a Committee of the Cabinet, but it had been proclaimed to the world in the time of the present Government. It had failed on account of the slackness of those who attended the deliberations of the Committee. It had not been worked as the authors of the proposal thought it might have been worked in the interests of the Empire. The Committee ought to have foreseen these difficulties with respect to mounted men; they were foreseen by military men. Though political differences occurred between Sir A. Milner and Sir W. Butler, Sir A. Milner consulted General Butler on the military aspect of the situation, and General Butler’s opinions were known to the Government, or should have been. They were known to Sir A. Milner at any rate and were not concealed by him when he was in this country a year ago. According to his (Sir C. Dilke’s) information, which reached him immediately after the statement had been made to Sir A. Milner, General Sir W. Butler declared that 60,000 men would be required in Cape Colony and 25,000 men in Natal. Leaving that, however, what was the attitude of the Cabinet with regard to the need for cavalry? They telegraphed to the Colonies to refuse mounted men. They gave their reasons in the telegram of October 3: ‘In view of the numbers already available, infantry most and cavalry least serviceable.’ On December 16 they telegraphed to the Colonies, ‘Mounted men preferred.’ After all the loss of life that had taken place, and the months of checks and reverses, they had discovered what competent soldiers had discovered before the war, and must have told them, that mounted men were essential for a campaign of this kind.”
In reply, the Under-Secretary of State for War made the first telling and apposite statement which had been furnished for the Government during the course of the proceedings. His exposition was straightforwardness itself. Though merely the mouthpiece of the Government, Mr. Wyndham gave utterance to definite statements which created a very favourable impression throughout the country, and served at once to wipe away the taste of foregone pronouncements. He said: