T HINGS begin to go better in Somaliland This week brings
us the news of the first real success which has attended the British arms. It is not yet clear whether the force of five thousand men which Sir Charles Egerton scattered on Sunday at Jidballi represents the main fighting force of the Mullah, but in any case the victory is of a nature to give new hope and energy to our troops. The position was apparently held by the Dervishes for its value for pasturage and water in that arid country ; and if we can repeat the same tactics at other such centres we may shortly break up the resistance. The enemy seem to have charged once with that fierce religious enthusiasm which we have already met in the Soudan ; but the en- durance of human nature, however fanatical, is limited, and they could not support the fire of our infantry. It is rare for us to find even among Moslem fanatics that complete disregard of death which inspires a Ghazi rush, or which has more than once enabled the Der- vishes to break a British square,—rare, at least, in the mass, though we may find many isolated examples in our recent military history. The victory has been achieved, we regret to learn, at a heavy expense to our commis- sioned officers, among whom twelve casualties are reported, including three deaths. This fact stands out in relief against the very light losses of the ranks ; but it must always be so when Englishmen have to lead auxiliary troops, who have not the support of a long service record. The moral effect is of such immense consequence that the officer has to hazard his life in a way which in a normal campaign would be thought Quixotic. If it is indeed the main force of the Mullah which has been routed, it is im- probable that the leader will be able to gather a new army, and we shall in all likelihood see the kind of desultory chase with which the Soudan has familiarised us, till the Mullah is at last killed or captured. No war of this sort is ended till the leader, whose religious sanctity is the chief inspiration of his followers, is made incapable of further mischief. The Somaliland Campaign is therefore, as we have already pointed out, primarily a transport problem. In actual fighting power our men, armed with modern resources, are more than a match for the enemy, however brave and reckless of life. But the vast waterless country has also to be fought with. One way is, of course, that adopted. with such success in the Soudan,—to push forward the base by means of a railway till the resources of civilisation are brought to the very lines of the enemy. But in a country which we do not desire to hold or develop, this method, which involves great expense and delay, would be scarcely justified. The other way is to secure such a perfection of transport arrangements, combined with a capable Intelligence Department, that we can make the best possible use of water-holes and pasture, and keep all the parts of our force in touch with each other. The superior mobility and local knowledge of the Mullah's force will be neutralised by our greater command of the materiel of war. It is not an easy problem, but we have every hope that Sir Charles Egerton will solve it.
The only justification for the campaign is the safety of Egypt. Somaliland has few strategic and no intrinsic advantages to make it worth having. But we dare not permit an insurgent Moslem army to run riot within sight of Egypt's frontiers in view of her recent history. It is true that no parts of the Egyptian dominions are directly threatened, the apparent objective of the Mullah being Abyssinia; but we cannot allow any ebullitions of fanaticism to go unheeded when we remember that in a religious war what to-day is an insignificant force may be to-morrow a devastating army. In Egypt we have a race of the same faith, and to allow a Mandi or a Khalifs to preach his gospel unchecked on our borders is not only to make peaceful development in the remoter parts impossible, but to permit a direct menace to the quiet of the Lower Nile. We have before this stated our opinion that the Somaliland business was mismanaged at the first and undertaken with insufficient knowledge ; but having assumed the offensive, the sooner we do the work, and do it thoroughly, the better. The enterprise may possibly produce some results of lasting value. We are fighting with what is perhaps the most dangerous, not even excepting the Zulus, of the black races of Africa. The strong Ethiopian race which forms the aristocracy in all the native kingdoms of Central Africa is not an enemy to despise, especially when it is mixed with the formidable Arab blood. We are using against it, under British officers, a number of native African Regulars and a certain number of friendly native Irregulars, stiffened by some British and Indian troops. It is a chance to form out of our African subjects fighting regiments of the class of the Sikhs, for after the Mullah the ordinary native insurgent will be a simple matter, and it is well to begin by training our men in a difficult task. It means, we fear, a high mortality among British officers ; but many gallant soldiers are ready to run the risk and do the work. We shall also, if we mistake not, so consolidate the Abyssinian Alliance that our dealings with the Emperor will be easier for the future. Abyssinia, as the source of one of her chief water supplies, must play a large part in the development of Egypt ; and the Somaliland Campaign is at any rate teaching us some- thing of Abyssinia and her people, and bringing us into closer relations with the Ethiopian King of Kings. Africa is so much of a piece, that it is impossible to neglect one part in the development of another, and it may be that after this campaign many questions of the Eastern Soudan and of Northern Uganda will be nearer settlement.
As a background to all European dominion in North Africa there looms the great Moslem population, which is capable of being roused at any moment from its attitude of placid indifference to politics by the advent of a prophet. In a little while the lethargic people are transformed into a crusading army, controlled and organised by a religious brotherhood. Whenever such a crusade arises the civilised world must combine to crush it, or allow that hardly won land to relapse into primeval savagery. We have killed the slave trade ; it remains now to stamp out the last embers of fanaticism. A Dervish invasion, while full of horrors, is less formidable than is generally imagined. The carelessness of death which fanaticism gives is checkmated by the limits which Nature has placed upon human endurance, and also by the quality of their faith. Such an army is necessarily ill-disciplined and primitive in its equipment ; and we have long since proved that discipline and the weapons of a scientific civilisation can always turn it back. Again, if the Dervish can charge, he can also run away. The God who will take his soul to Paradise if he perishes will also arrange that the Faith- ful shall triumph some other day. Fatalism, it cannot be too often pointed out, is a two-edged weapon, and can induce both amazing valour and complete inertia. If we can resist the onset, we may profit by the recoil, and the lethargy which follows recoil. And meanwhile our slow civilisation is creeping on, and daily making the Moslem tribes less malleable under the oratory of a bloodthirsty dreamer of dreams.
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