SCHEME.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR:1
Sin,—There are a. few points in the new Army scheme re- lating to Volunteers which seem to call for comment beyond that which they have already received.
It appears from the notes complementary to Mr. Arnold-Forster's speech which have been published that the division of tho hundred and eighty thousand Volunteers still to be retained into sixty thousand to be better trained, and one hundred and twenty thousand to be less trained, than are Volunteers at present, is to be by " corps." This would seem to mean that under the new scheme some battalions are to give more service than at present, and to be better paid for so doing, while the remaining battalions are to receive even less support than at present, and, consequently, are to have even less opportunity of becoming efficient. Surely, Sir, this at least is wrong! Volunteer battalions, except in some parts of London, are organisations based upon locality. Who is to say that some localities are capable of supplying full battalions with the proper complement of officers and men, all prepared to make greater sacrifices of time and service than at present, while other localities are not?
As to the wisdom of dividing Volunteers into two classes at all, it is not my purpose to say anything ; but if the division is to be, then surely it should be on the lines on which every battalion during the war was divided, when it contributed a proportion of officers and men able and willing to go to the front, while those of its members who were unable to go remained at home to perform the proper functions of Volunteers in the scheme of home defence. Every battalion has its grades of members, from the most enthusiastic and most efficient to the least so ; and, out of the higher of these grades the requisite first-class Volunteers to make up the sixty thousand can be found, and formed into special companies in each battalion ; while of the other class, there need be no doubt about finding the proper number for that. It . is only by preserving the local organisation more or less as it now exists that all the enthusiasts, wherever they may happen to live, will have the chance of serving their country as they wish.
The suggestion that the corps containing the hundred and twenty thousand men who are to be less efficient than at present are to be supported to the extent of only 45 per head, as against the present ST, seems to be the final note of the repeated death-knells to which the force has of recent years
been listening. It is the inadequacy of the financial support at the present level which is keeping back most Volunteer battalions. In " working-men" battalions, which to-day are the majority, it is always the lack of money which stands in the way of greater efficiency. Men of the artisan class cannot give time and money. They are willing to give time and service, but the money must be found elsewhere. With more money men could be properly trained in musketry ; at present such training is usually impossible on the ground of expense of travel- ling to and from a distant range. With more money, in these working-men battalions at any rate, money enough to pay the men Army rates and allowances, the difficulty of camp attendance would disappear. It is only the lack of money which prevents expansion and greater efficiency in every direction.
But with less money, a lower rate per man, a smaller establish- ment, and so fewer men on which to draw grants, it is no longer a question of carrying on regiments less efficiently than at present, but of carrying them on at all. Volunteer corps are in great part private organisations with debts, rents, establishment charges, and a host of financial obligations for which commanding officers are personally liable. Who in face of this scheme will care to continue to be the commanding officer, still less become the commanding officer, of a battalion likely to be put in the second rank with a smaller establishment and a smaller grant per man? To invite financial loss is simply modern quixotism. To you, Sir, who are familiar with the needs and difficulties of the Volunteer Force, there is little that is new in my views and state- meats. But I am sending them in the hope that you may print them for the benefit of the less enlightened.
—I am, Sir, &c., H. F. P.
THE NEW ARMY SCHEME. pro THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR.1
Previous page
