INDIA AND IMPERIAL DEFENCE.
[To TEE EDITOR OF TER "SPECTATOR."] Sra,—The time is at hand to decide upon some line of policy for the next Imperial Conference. So far as one can learn, it has been arranged to discuss the official status of the High Commissioners of the Dominions and a few other matters of equal levity ; and if one may take certain hints as representing the official attitude, there is a mind to treat all the large questions as satisfactorily settled, leaving to future Confer- ences the task of adjusting the gold braid on the Imperial uniform. Defence, for example, I have heard it explained in a high quarter, "was settled by the last Defence Conference." Yet so far from being "settled," Imperial defence organisa- tion is, in truth, only begun. It is true that apparently there is no work of conversion remaining to be done. From two opposite quarters there have come remarkable movements towards unity. Great Britain has altogether abandoned the attitude of the wise parent who knows what the children should want to do, and is determined that they shall do it. Australia, the unruly but generous-hearted child of the family, which was ready to revolt at Eureka, which sent back the last shipload of British convicts in the teeth of British warships, is enlisting a citizen army after the plans of Lord Kitchener, and a navy the organisation of which follows without the change of a comma the suggestions of the British Admiralty. Nevertheless the organisation of Imperial defence is but begun; and if Imperial defence is a banned subject at the next Imperial Conference, the progress of that organisation will receive a serious check.
One great fault is that India has been altogether neg- lected in the scheme of co-ordination for the safety of the Empire. That is a matter which calls for prompt attention. All that there is of patriotism in the British Parliament should be summoned new to see that the Imperial Conference of 1911 does discuss the defence question, and that India is represented at that Conference. The importance of India in any scheme of Imperial defence is lucidly explained in "An Imperial Military System," by Captain D. I. Macaulay (Clowes and Sons). From that short pamphlet can be gained a clear idea of a complete Imperial defence policy, naval and military. In some details its observations have been put out of date by the last Defence Conference ; but in regard to India the position is still exactly as he stated it last year. The pamphlet might be taken as the basis for discussion at the next Imperial Conference on Defence.
Briefly, the position in regard to India is this. India is at once a great source of strength and of weakness,—of strength because of its great wealth, of weakness because of the demands its garrisoning makes on the military resources of Empire. No scheme of Imperial defence which ignores India can calculate properly either the extent of the danger or the means to meet the danger. It is a railway balance-sheet with the coal bill and the passenger traffic both left out of con- sideration. Captain Macaulay suggests that with a full Imperial organisation of defence the supply of reinforcements to India in time of war might be entrusted to a large extent to the self-governing Dominions (three of which, Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand, are much nearer to India than is Great Britain); that thus the British Army would be relieved of a great burden, and the Indian taxpayer also; that in return the responsibility could be put upon India of main- taining (though not providing) an Indian Ocean Fleet (manned by British sailors). It would take up too much space to attempt any detailed description of a plan which shows a bold geographical strategy as well as a sound political instinct. (Imperial defence is partly a matter of strategy; it is also partly a, matter of studying the susceptibilities of the various partner
nations.) But in a sentence or two the advantages of such an organisation can be indicated. The Indian Ocean Fleet from its Singapore base would dominate the Pacific. Australia, Canada, and New Zealand alike would be guarded on a com- manding flank against any attack from Asia. The national feeling of India would be gratified by the more direct participation in the work of the Empire. Canada, Australia, and New Zealand would, at the price of a light military responsibility, secure naval guard of their Pacific frontiers.
I think that with discussion this plan, or something near to it, would get prompt Imperial acceptance. I can recall in the early days of the universal service agitation in Australia often suggesting from the platform that one benefit from the system, besides securing our national integrity, would be the power it gave to throw an expeditionary army into Asia if that were needed; and the suggestion was always warmly welcomed. The people who cheered it probably objected as strongly as I did when an effort had been made some years previously by an English Commander-in-Chief to limit Australian military organisation to the raising of an expedi- tionary force, leaving our national defence solely to the British Navy. The attitude of the overseas Dominions, as I read it—certainly the attitude of Australia—is that we are prepared to do nothing that we are ordered to do ; that we are prepared to do anything that is fair and right after full and free discussion. It has been the experience of every Imperial Conference that difficulties vanished so soon as they were discussed. There is too much of parental pride on the one side, of filial affection on the other, to allow of a deadlock arising out of any debate. There is too much of the stubborn British pride on all sides to allow of anything but a deadlock when it is sought to give orders instead of calling a Council. An Imperial discussion next year on Imperial defence with India represented is more than advisable; it is necessary.
[As our readers know, we hold that India ought to do far more than she does in the matter of naval defence. For that reason we desire a revival of the Indian Marine. If at the same time our other Asiatic Dependencies—i.e., Ceylon, the Straits Settlements, the Malay Federation, and Hong-kong- were to do their part, we should have made a great step in advance. If, further, New Zealand and Australia would co-operate, our naval position in the Indian Ocean and the Pacific might be rendered far stronger than now. By all means let the point be discussed at the next Conference ; but why not go further, and appoint a Committee to decide the proportion of naval power which should fairly be provided by India and the other Asiatic Dependencies of the Crown? At present we have no data available. We all admit India's duty to protect her land frontiers. Why not also her shores ?—En. Spectator.]
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