about Moukden. General Linevitch was in New chwang and asked laughingly how long the war would last, and how many men Russia would need for a decisive Manchurian campaign. "Three years and half a million men," was the answer he got, which sent him into fits of laughter. "When we have 300,000 men," he retorted, in the inevitable Russian way, "we will crush the Japanese flat-flat as the Liao plain." In spite of all his rough soldierways, Linevitch evidently has the Russian trick for effective phrase-making. Who could equal General Kuropatkin's order beginning with the sonorous "the inflexible will of the Emperor will be inflexibly executed," or Stoessel's "Great Sovereign, forgive us. We have done all that was humanly possible." It is such language which shows the complex but brilliant Russian character. Into Linevitch's hands are placed for the time being, until the fresh inevitable shuffling of cards, the destinies of Russia in Manchuria; and now at last we come to that absorbing consideration-the campaign of the future. What are the Russians going to do? How long will they resist the victorious march of the Japanese? and how will they dispose their forces?—these are some of the questions which must be answered, even though it be tentatively, in order to make any future discussion justifiable. 1 1 Publisher's Note.-The conclusion of peace has made it seem desirable to relegate to an appendix the author's interesting forecast of Japanese strategy in Manchuria, and of the possible change in fortune which might be produced by a new spirit in Russian policy. They are retained as affording, perhaps, some key to the decision of Japan's diplomatists. 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 |