CHAPTER XXVIII

THE GREAT MISTAKES OF THE WAR

THE Condition in Manchuria and Korea at the time of the outbreak of war should be fully realised by now. Russia never really menaced Korea in any way excepting with bluff; that is to say, she was seeking to acquire a foothold but had not yet acquired it. In Manchuria, instead of having completely absorbed the country as was universally stated at the beginning of February, 1904, she possessed a total number of troops and railway guards which scarcely exceeded 90,000 men, and which was powerless to rule the population. A series of sharp blows struck quickly and resolutely would have brought about the most sensational collapse recorded in the world's history; but the collapse, although it has actually taken place, finds Russian armies a year and a half after the beginning of the war still only 190 miles from Newchwang and occupying considerably more than three-quarters of Manchuria; nor can the fact be lost sight of that the Russian battle-line is more formidable than it ever was before.

The 90,000 armed men who represented the Czar's might in the disputed Chinese provinces in February, 1904, had four tasks to perform; to guard 1,600 miles of Manchurian railway from the attack of train-wreckers; to garrison Port Arthur; to defend the Yalu line; and to watch 400 miles of Manchurian coast against Japanese descents. Such a force was therefore entirely inadequate for the task, knew and felt its inadequacy, and expected daily, if not complete annihilation, at least rapid defeat. Reinforcements could not begin to arrive regularly for several weeks as the Russian mobilisation scheme is slow and clumsy; the Eastern Siberian forces were nearly all employed in Manchuria and the Primorsk, and the Amur military district mobilisation was required for the defence of Vladivostok, Possiet Bay, and the adjacent territory. Therefore, reinforcements in any numbers had to come from Western Siberia and Russia itself, and ten to fifteen weeks had to elapse before such reinforcements would improve the situation from the Russian point of view. Japan had therefore three months in which she might have acted as she pleased in Manchuria without meeting with serious opposition anywhere. Those three months must be counted lost.

In addition to the above, the opening of hostilities found Admiral Alexeieff, as Viceroy of the Far East, still absolutely supreme and also absolutely incompetent to direct the enormous mass of naval and military politico-diplomatic affairs awaiting his

immediate attention without hopeless confusion ensuing. Admiral Alexeieff had gathered round himself a brilliant but unbusinesslike staff and stood directly for Czarism and the Grand Ducal party. Allied by morganatic marriage to one of the greatest personages at the Imperial Court, whose name it would be indiscreet to mention, his position was unassailable until heavy disasters made his temporary effacement advisable. This was another reason why the Japanese should have struck promptly, a reason more powerful than the first, as confusion is the most potent ally it is possible to have.

In furtherance of his own policy and of the Manchurian-Korean bluff, Admiral Alexeieff had, at the end of 1903, despatched large numbers of the troops massed in Port Arthur to the Yalu line and elsewhere along the coast, leaving only one brigade and some fortress troops, perhaps some 7,000 men in all, at Port Arthur. Everything, therefore, was in Japan's favour. She was properly informed, as there were Japanese Intelligence Departments at Port Arthur, Dalny, Newchwang, Haicheng, Liaoyang, Moukden, Tiehling, Kuan Cheng yu, Kirin, Harbin, and certain other places. Further, Japan knew the exact condition of the Russian fleet, and that condition indicated that the Port Arthur Squadron was not a serious naval force.

Having everything thus in her favour, Japan showed some undue precipitancy, if the departure of the additional Russian Squadron from Suez

hastened the breaking off of negotiations. Until the naval reinforcements passed Singapore-which is fifteen days' steaming at moderate speed from Port Arthur-there was no need for hurry. The time the additional squadron would have reached Singapore would have been approximately the 1st March, and had negotiations been therefore continued three weeks longer it would have permitted the entire secret mobilisation of the Japanese army-then thirteen divisions totalling some 550,000 men; and the completion of all other preparations should have included the despatch of thirty powerful armed bridge-wrecking parties to Manchuria and the entry into the Port Arthur inner harbour a day or two before the rupture of negotiations of two or three cement-laden ships, which could have crept to the neck of the harbour and sunk themselves in the fairway immediately firing commenced. Had the rupture been delayed until the 1st March, the opening of the Liao river would also have allowed Newchwang to be seized within a week or two; and, as has been amply proved, Newchwang and not Dalny is the true base in Manchuria from whence to conduct all operations.

The military operations of the Japanese occupying the first three priceless months of the war-the Kuroki march up the Korean peninsula-can only be explained by four things: that the shadow of the Colossus had fallen so long across Korea that it had finally ended by impressing the Japanese imagination; that Japanese generals wished to take

no risks in their first encounter with European troops; that Admiral Togo was not certain of crushing the Russian fleet immediately; and that Japanese credit did not permit any risks being taken. None of this was based on sound premises, as subsequent events have indeed shown. For had the Russian fleet and Russian army been well handled, they would have delayed the cautious Japanese programme to such an extent that the programme would have had to be largely recast. Even as it is, although it has not miscarried (as some youthful correspondents allege) it has been delayed greatly, and everything is more than half a year behind-hand. That is, every step has taken, and is taking, twice or three times as long as the paper-estimates deemed necessary; and, therefore, the original Japanese idea that it would take two years to drive the Russians out of inhabited Manchuria and off the Pacific littoral is likely to be proved entirely wrong. That Japan was expected to act rapidly by some authorities is clearly shown by the calculation of one of the foremost military critics in England, who published notes in which it was estimated that the Japanese advance should reach Harbin by the first week in May, 1904, i.e. twelve weeks after the outbreak of war.

As has already been written in preceding pages, there should have been but two Japanese objectives in the Manchurian regions-Port Arthur, the brain of the army and navy, and Harbin, the stomach of both. Every effort should have been made