THE WAR MINISTER.
Bayswater, 81h ..Tune. SIR—As you frequently do you have in this matter taken a sounder view than your contemporaries, and were the first to indicate that you were not satisfied that the mere institution of the office of Secretary of State for the War Depaitment would of itself reniedy the evils resulting from the pre- sent no system. Believing you were right, I would submit the following ob- servations on the subject.
I find all those whose opinions we are accustomed to treat with reaped dealing with the question solely as a military one,—meaning thereby the Army ! Are, then, England's wars usually carried on by the Army alone ? Great as it may be, is the Army expenditure the only item of importance ? Do our fleets—whose expense in their full efficiency by the use of steam, is doubled—go for nothing ? Are the means and manner of despatching troops of the different arms of the service, with the necessary munitions of war, to the seat of operations, the beat ealculated to insure their simultaneous arri- val at the point of destination in the best possible state for immediate co- operative action ? Leaving unquestioned the Importance of the mere a. d. view of the matter, can any head, on whosoever's shoulders it may rest, be qualified to pronounce decidedly on each arrangement, as best calculated to insure the ready action of our armies and fleets, at once in their fullest ea- ciency and under the soundest pecuniary economy ? Did it need a "Head" to discover the absurdity of the stock ? The brains of the poor soldier found it out long ago. Did it need a "Head" to discover in January 1854 that -the Mink rifle throws ball farther and truer than old "brown Bees"? Yet when our troops had left, we sent some Minie rifles after them • they to learn the use of them somewhere between Malta and Varna. After the loss of the Tiger, we may probably supply our steamers, and smaller craft too, with those efficient weapons, which perhaps might have saved the Tiger' or at least have enabled her brave crew to sell her dearly. Did it need a "Head" to discover that "battle ships" could not go into shallow water ? The Swedes knew it long ago, and they, as well as Nicholas, had gun-boats. Did it need a "Head" to discover that if the infantry went to the East for the most part in steamers, the artillery next for the most part in sailing- ships, and the cavalry last in for the most part sailing-vessels, that the com- bined force could not possibly be simultaneously available when urgently required ? Sir James Graham, whose head is good enough in all matters he can reasonably be supposed to understand, was made to say, when ques- tioned in his place in Parliament as First Lord of the Admiralty, first, that after mature consideration of the matter by competent authorities, steamers were pronounced inapplicable to the conveyance of horses; then, on a subse- quent occasion, that steamers were not available; at last, he was brought to the admission that, after further consideration by "competent authorities," steamers were applicable to the conveyance of horses. And we have engaged steamers for the service on terms preposterously extravagant. What is to be learned from this ? Simply how absurdly an unprofessional "Head" may be led astray by professional departmental subordinates. And to what conclusion does it point ? That no mere "Read," had we Solomon for the office, will alone suffice to rectify existent wrong.
With the unprofessional "Head," when questioned in Parliament, the ' matter usually takes this turn—the " unprofessional " frankly alludes to the notorious fact that he is so : but "the matter was in the hands of so , and so of whose zeal and professional ability no honourable Member could entertain a doubt." (" Hear, hear !" ) And thus the matter passes ; be- I gun, conceived, and executed in error, nevertheless. 1 We must therefore look into _Departments, and not merely to the Heads of them.
I shall leave military matters, and advert more particularly to nautical ! affairs, as those I best understand. And here there is alone a wide field; but space may not permit, and I will merely say, assuming, in charity, in- , competence as the cause, that the public money has been wasted to an ' conceivable extent through carrying out operations in the mode suggested by parties who, by earwigging incompetent Heads, have served friends at the expense of the public. And who shall tell of the host of minor and meaner functionaries who work this wrong ? The "Head," then, we are to have, to be of any use, should be one who can and will by vigorous scrutiny ascertain not merely who are truly efficient men but what vermin there be in official holes who have gained place—(I
Zeulinberland reign, at least on the Northumberland plan, fitness having ' now more particularly of naval matters, if not in the time of the Nor- no place among the essentials for office)—and a "Head" too who having done
so, shall fearlessly sweep out the temple of the War god. Can any "Head" do this ? Yet not until it is done may we hope for better things. Without it, the so-called "Head" will be but a screen for the real canker at the core.
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