LORD KITCHENER AND THE INDIAN ARMY.
THOUGH we were unable to accept without misgiving Mr. Morley's final decision in regard to the question of the predominance of the civil power in India, we appreciated the immense difficulty of his position, and held that acquiescence was a duty imposed upon those who realised the gravity of the situation. In view of all the circumstances, we felt that it would be best to withhold further discussion, and we hoped that it might prove unnecessary to reopen the question involved either in Parliament or in the Press until the completion of Lord Kitchener's tenure of office. The publication of a letter from the special correspondent of the Times in India in Tuesday's paper makes it, however, impossible for us to persevere in the policy of silence. The writer of that letter is not only one of the ablest of living publicists, but one who has an intimate knowledge of the politics of the Empire, and who realises the gravity of the situation with which he is dealing. One may feel certain that he would not have asked the Times to publish his criticism of Lord Kitchener's handling of the Indian Army unless he had convinced himself of the absolute necessity of informing public opinion at home upon the serious character of the influences at work.
The special correspondent of the Times, after noting that the best and most experienced opinion in India remains unalterably convinced of the dangers with which the policy initiated by the late Cabinet in regard to the position of the Commander-in-Chief is fraught, points out that at this moment the vital question is that of the efficiency of the native Army. He insists, with true states- manship of view, that the Indian Army is something much more than a mere military machine. "It is one of the most valuable links between the ruling and the subject races," and has from the beginnings of our connection with India helped to bind some of the finest of the native races to the paramount power. It was, as he says, the wide- spread, though erroneous, belief that these links were to be broken which was one of the main causes of the Mutiny. The normal relations between the British officers in India and their native fellows in arms, both officers and mei, have always been of a specially close and intimate kind, and the loyalty that springs from military comradeship has in no small measure blotted out the sense of depend- ence which exists in the case of the civil population. Clive in his great speech in the House of Commons declared : "If ever a Mussulman loved a Christian, Mir Jaffir loved me." Hundreds of British officers have felt able to think and speak in a similar spirit of the men, whether Mohammedans or Sikhs, Ghoorkas or Rajputs, who have served with and under them. In a word, it is in the native Army that Briton and Indian come closest together. Here is the point of sympathy, if also the point of danger. In these circumstances, we cannot be too careful, nay, toO anxious, to maintain the old traditions and the old status of the native Army. It was because the former Military Department, which the late Government at the bidding of Lord Kitchener destroyed, provided machinery for the maintenance of the best traditions of the native Army that it was so valuable. While it remained as an efficient counterbalance in the Indian system there was little risk in placing a soldier without Indian experience in the position of Commander-in-Chief. Such an officer could bring new ideas into the Indian Army, but, at the same time, any tendency to interfere with or impair the essential structure of that Army could. be checked by the representations which the Military Department, inspired by the accumulated experience of over a hundred years, were able to make to the Governor- General in Council. What the obliteration of the Military Department under its old inspiration means when trans- lated into concrete fact is shown in the letter of the special correspondent of the Times. He tells us that there is only too much reason to believe that Lord Kitchener does not realise that the sense of loyalty in the Indian Army is one of the greatest moral as well as material assets of the British raj :--
"Lord Kitchener's attitude towards the native Army has created both within and outside its ranks the impression that he holds it in very slight esteem, and that he regards its peculiar customs and traditions with impatience as senseless obstacles to the homogeneity of an ideal Army. The mere neglect of personal courtesies to which native officers have hitherto been accustomed and the absence of those kindly manifestations of comradeship which endeared so many of his predecessors to the Indian Army would not alone have sufficed to create that impression, had not various suggestions emanating from headquarters tended also to arouse apprehensions of far-reaching changes in the organisation of the Indian Army."
Many of these suggestions, the Times correspondent goes on to say, were no doubt often merely speculative, and were wisely abandoned before they had taken definite shape; but in spite of that, they went far enough to create an atmosphere of distrust and alarm which the denials failed to dispel. But besides creating an atmosphere of suspicion, such matters as Lord Kitchener's scheme for the redistribution of garrisons have tended to create a feeling of discontent. The native soldier feels that military service is tending more and more to divorce him from his home, and to render more difficult and less frequent the periodical visits on furlough which he has hitherto been able to pay to his family. In an army where so large a proportion of both soldiers and officers are married this is a very serious consideration. Again, the activity in the matter of field days, camps of exercise, and. manceuvres, things excellent in themselves, has tended to increase the drain on the very small pecuniary reward for which the Indian soldier serves. The proof that such criticisms as these are not baseless is to be found in the reluctance of old soldiers to re-engage, and the recruiting difficulties that have of late arisen in many of what were once exceedingly popular regiments. Nor is the anxiety in regard to the present state of affairs confined to the classes from which the soldiers are drawn. The .correspondent of the Times tells us that— "It is somewhat ominous that nowhere does greater anxiety prevail as to the potential danger of a headstrong regime, ignorant or careless of the feelings of the native Army, than amongst educated and loyal natives, who are far more familiar than Europeans can possibly be with the real sentiments of their kinsmen with the colours."
, 'Though the snbject is necessarily one of great difficulty and delicacy, the correspondent of the Times does not shrink from handling the question of personality in Lord Kitchener's case. He declares that Lord Kitchener's, friends can hardly demy.that his masterfulness grows with increasing power, and that the orders which he so often hastily issues and as hastily withdraws no longer show the same industry and application to detail, or the same ' devotion to economy, which characterised his work in Egypt "Still less can his friends deny that he has no personal know. ledgeof the Indian character ; for he has never had any Indian experience, and, arriving for the first time in India as Com- mander-in-Chief, he has not had, the opportunities of coming into contact with Indian life which most of his predecessors had found iii the earlier stages of their career.1 His constitutional intoler- ance of all opposition unfits him to learn from those who have had the experience which he lacks. In fact, with regard both to the Indian Army and to the question of Army administration, Lord Kitchener's views, which are generally assumed to have • been based on his experience since he came to India, were brought with him ready-made from England, and, within a few weeks after he had landed at Bombay, he expressed them during the Delhi Durbar as forcibly as at any time since. Facts have been made to fit in with them."
The correspondent of the Times ends his letter by touching upon a matter to which we should not ourselves have thought it prudent to allude. Since, however, he has taken the responsibility of dealing with it and. has made it public, we feel that reticence in our case is no longer necessary. After speaking of Lord Kitchener's adminis- tration of the Egyptian Army, and pointing out—which is no more than the bare truth—how largely the restrain- ing and directing influence of Lord Cromer's experi- ence and wisdom contributed to the success achieved, he proceeds to mention how "the reconquest of the Soudan was very nearly wrecked not long afterwards in a disaster due to the same defects of which many people dread the consequences in India" "Only a short time before Lord Kitchener was ordered to South Africa, an incipient mutiny amongst the native troops in the Soudan, which arose out of his disregard in peace-time for peculiar idiosyncrasies that he had safely ignored so long as the excite- ment of active service lasted, was only detected and suppressed at the eleventh hour. The suppression of Lord Cromer's ' opinion ' on Lord Kitchener's scheme is easily explained when one remem- bers that he alone combined with an intimate knowledge of the Indian aspects of the question a still more intimate knowledge of the defects of Lord Kitchener's qualities."
Since, as we have said, the matter has been raised. in public, we feel justified in endorsing what is stated by the correspondent of the Times. The mutiny of ihe Soudanese troops at Khartoum—for mutiny, in effect, it was—was, it can hardly be doubted, due to the defects in the military administration of Lord Kitchener, defects which in peace-time, while Lord Kitchener was under the direct influence of Lord Cromer in Cairo, were pre- vented from assuming dangerous proportions, but which were exaggerated by the virtual autonomy which Lord Kitchener necessarily enjoyed in the Soudan. The corre- spondent of the Times is, however, we think, wrong in saying that the outbreak took place before Lord Kitchener ceased to be Sirdar. Unless we are mistaken, it took place shortly after his departure. This fact makes no difference as far BA the moral to be drawn is concerned. Though the actual outbreak did. not occur till a few weeks after Lord. Kitchener had left Egypt for South Africa, the conditions which produced the outbreak were, as we have said, the result of Lord Kitchener's policy. In the same way, it is more than likely, if any serious trouble arises owing to Lord Kitchener's handling of the Indian Army, that such trouble will not arise till Lord Kitchener's period of office has expired, as it will expire• in another eighteen months. It is when his influence—which, if injudicious, is no doubt also potent—has been with- drawn that we may expect to reap the full fruits of the policy which has placed that delicate machine, the native Army of India, at the absolute disposal of a man who knows little of its traditions or peculiar character, and whose belief is that as long as soldiers can be forced to obey all must be well with an army.
Before leaving the Subject of our article we must notice the fact that Thursday's Times contains a long letter signed "A Soldier" in defence of Lord Kitchener. In this letter the allegations of a lack of personal courtesy towards native officers are energetically rebutted, and Lord Kitchener's policy is generally supported. Though we feel bound in fairness to mention the appearance of the letter, we cannot profess to be greatly impressed by the arguments employed.
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