TOPICS OF TIIE DAY.
THE TURN OF THE TIDE. THE destruction of the Turkish army under Mukhtar Pasha marks, in all probability, the turn of the tide in this cam- paign, and even as an isolated event, is one of great importance. The victory, decisive as it seems to have been, does not give Armenia to the Russians, for they have still to force their way to Erzeroum, and to capture Kars by a siege which, if carried on in winter, may prove a most exhausting operation ; but it reveals to the world, and especially to the Russians and Turks, some facts of the gravest moment. In the first place, it shows that the Turks are not, as Europe had begun to imagine, the superiors of the Russians in the field. The Turkish army before Kars had everything in its favour that any Turkish army is likely to have,—a General in whom it believed, and whom the Sultan had just honoured with the title of "Victorious," a position of its own choosing, and soldiers elated with a long continuance of unexpected success. Its numbers were suffi- cient, its weapons better, its confidence as high as it was possible for confidence to be. Nevertheless, this army, once fairly collared by Generals who understood their work, and who had great forces at their disposal, was in a few hours driven from its positions and broken in two, and so pursued that, while one wing lost thousands of prisoners, many guns, and 800 killed, on Mukb.tar Pasha's own estimate, the other, comprising three divisions, surrendered on the field. The lowest number of prisoners given in the Russian and English accounts is sixteen thousand. The General himself fled so fast—we mean no imputation on his courage, but note the fact only as evidence of the completeness of the rout—that he did not know what had become of his other wing, and the enormous proportion of prisoners to killed shows that the Army was utterly demoralised—was, in fact, like any other army of Asiatics when once fully conscious that all was over. This, indeed, is the grand lesson of the battle. The Turks surrendered, and did not die. As we said after Vicksburg, and repeat now, the capitulation of the troops of the weaker power shows that the stronger power must in the long run inevitably win. There is a form of courage, a courage of despair, a courage which takes no account of circumstances, and accepts death by starvation or the sword as a preferential alternative to sub- mission, which is rarely or never overcome by mere disparity of force. It exhausts the enemy until his victories are worthless. The Confederate soldiers, though as brave as their rivals, and equal to any effort which showed a possibility of success, did not exhibit courage in this supreme form, and neither do the Turks, and in that fact their future may be clearly read. This war is a struggle between fifty millions of white Europeans and about eleven millions of Asiatics, half-castes, and whites bred up under an Asiatic system ; and unless the Europeans lack perseverance, or the Asiatics exhibit exceptional valour, valour such as is found even in Western armies only in for- lorn hopes, the ultimate issue is foreordained. If the eleven millions, when "cornered," surrender, the fifty millions must win, even though their bondholders have to wait, and though Mahommedanism, as the Turkophiles believe, be a better religion than Christianity. Real fanaticism is a great force, and an especially great force when felt by men without the emo- tion of pity ; but the fanaticism which surrenders when out- manceuvred is not of much account. A Malay running amuck frightens a city ; but a Malay who, when the policemen are round him, asks for fair treatment, is no more formidable than any other murderer or criminal. The Turks in Asia have fought well, and have gained victories, but when beaten they have given way ; and therefore, being attacked by a greater Power of a much higher civilisation, they must sooner or later accept the terms their enemies may dictate. Apart altogether from the merits of the quarrel, force is on the Russian side, and if the Ottoman yields to force, as in this battle he has done, there is for him no hope. It has become evident that the Russians, when decently led, can apply force sharply, and that the Turks, though decently led, will yield to force, and in those facts is the ending of the only serious doubt. It may be weeks, or months, or a year before the Russians in Bulgaria will be as well led as the Russians in Armenia are, whether by the Grand Duke Michael, or General Loris Melikoff, or General Lazareff ; but whenever they are so led by a General who can plan, and strike, and follow up his advantage as the Russian General has done in Armenia, the Tullis will be beaten, and beaten, will give in. If, for example, Plevna surrounded and hungry, Plevna will surrender,—that is, the weaker army will give way to the stronger, as in any ordinary campaign.
This is the grand revelation of the struggle in Armenia ; but there is another one of scarcely less importance. Russian discouragement," of which even the Daily News, to our sur- prise, makes so much, does not greatly matter. No troops can have had more reasons for discouragement than the Russians in Armenia. They have been beaten over and over again, and that by a General whose previous record had been one of constant defeat, and an army which they were in- formed was half made up of barbarian volunteers. Their Generals have appeared totally incapable, so incapable that their recriminations have been matter of the most public comment. Their communications have always been in danger from insurrection, and are in danger now. For three months their lives have been wasted in vain attacks on nearly impregnable positions, which have brought them no nearer to their objective Erzeroum. Nevertheless, their Generals have urged them for- ward to most dangerous and exhausting tasks, and they have obeyed quietly, cheerfully, and without the slightest evidence either of reluctance, or hesitation, or over-haste. They are ail good troops as they ever were—that is, when well commanded among the best troops in the world, lacking something of 'go' that Western soldiers possess, and much too dependant on their officers, but patient, enduring, and full of the courage which can face anything that duty and discipline require. should be faced for the end. The truth is that Russians, though much more " repressed " than the English, grumble nImost as freely, like them, too, enjoy depreciatory comment passed by themselves on themselves—enjoying it as men enjoy sorrel as a sour stimulant to appetite and relief from the sof tnesses of cookery —and like them, do not see the connection between growling and. refusal to obey. As are the Russians in Armenia, so are the Russians in Bulgaria. When the hour arrives, the soldiers who seem to correspondents so cross and so discouraged, will hail battle as a relief from weariness, will go forward as cheer- fully as at first, and will win or lose, according to the amount of military skill and knowledge with which their efforts are dirs;cted. The Russian Army has suffered much from losses, much from disease, much from the absence of the elan im- parted by victory, but the weakness caused by a mutinous spirit may be put out of our calculations. If defeat had taught Russians to despair, neither the Russian army nor the Russian Empire would ever have been formed. Whatever there is in Russian troops will be there in the tenth engagement as in. the first, and the danger of Osman Pasha in the last struggle will be precisely the same as in the first,—that is, exactly proportioned to the amount of science displayed in the attack. The Turkophiles have no more to hope from the mutiny of the Russians than they have from the resolution of the Turks to die in the last ditch, or from that muddiness of the roada which, to judge from their accounts, hampers Russian artillery, while allowing Ottoman guns to roll along as easily as usual. We shall hear, we suppose, after this reverse to the Turkish arms, the usual rumours of peace, and the usual declarations that England is bound to mediate in "the interests of humanity and her own Imperial position." The interests of humanity, we once more repeat, require that the domination of the Ottoman caste in Eastern Europe should cease, that the misery which has been endured by millions should not have been suffered in vain ; and the interests of the British Empire are no more concerned in the maintenance of an evil despotism in Eastern Europe than they were when the war began, and many soldiers expected to see Constantinople taken in a month. Those who demand mediation demand it in the interests, not of Turkey or of the world, but of that Turkish minority which for four hundred years has, by its persistent oppression, prevented Eastern Europe from sharing in the progress of the West. As for peace, we see no signs of it whatever. The Russians cannot make peace until they have accomplished their end, the liberation of the Slav Christians of Europe from Asiatic misgovernment ; and the Turks will not make peace while there is a chance that victory on the Danube may restore their right to plunder their own provinces at will. Why should they, when they can but lose them in the end? The Pashas want no peace that will leave them stranded; and the people are convinced that the Turks are a match for all mankind. They may clamour for the exile of Mahmoud Damad, whose nominees, for all that is said, have hitherto been successful, or for a successor to the "Victorious Mukhtar, or for the banishment of all Englishmen, Sir Arnold Kemball having clearly been the ultimate cause of the defeat in Armenia, but they will not clamour for peace till the enemy is much nearer to their gates. We have never done the dominant caste injustice on this point. It means to remain dominant till it is beaten, and if beaten and compelled to acknowledge the equality of all races, would as soon be ruled by an Emperor of Byzantium as by a successor of the Khalifs. It is not fighting for him, but for Islam—which no defeat can affect—and for its own ascendancy, which equality would destroy equally with defeat. It is true, tho Sultan is said to dislike the war, and to be eager for peace ; but Sultans, like other Turkish statesmen, are in the habit of saying to Europeans very smooth things, and this one always adds that the peace he desires is "an honourable peace," peace "on the basis of the status quo." There is no doubt that he desires this, or that he would be mad not to desire an arrangement which would leave him absolute master of his whole Empire, free from debt, and with a reputation which would render attack during his lifetime very improbable. As, however, the object of the war, the end for which so much has been sacrificed, is the abolition of the status quo, the men- tion of that condition of peace turns the Sultan's wish into a sarcastic aspiration at the expense of the Powers who asked that the status quo should, in the interests of humanity, be slightly modified. If the Turks have been beaten enough to make the necessary concessions, of course there may be peace, but the Turks have not been beaten in Europe, and think themselves equal to resistance against the world. They are deluded, but they are not weak.
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