TOPICS OF THE DAY.
SIR MICHAEL HICKS BEACH ON THE WAR OFFICE.
WE are deeply gratefulto Sir Michael Hicks Beach for his s at Bristol on Monday in regard to the War Office, but it is clear that he cannot now merely leave matters where they were. He has said either too much or too little. Let us quote his actual words. After remarking that nobody outside the War Office believed that the War Office properly expended the people's money, and after declaring that it must not be supposed that he was saying anything against Mr. Brodrick, Sir Michael Hicks Beach conti—,ed :—" The country wanted a drastic reform at the War ,,J1C43, and this reform was wanted in the military rather than in the civil element. But they would never reform the War Office or the Army until they made the great mass of military officers pay more attention to the duties of their profession, and devote their lives to them as did our Navy officers, and until they removed all those outside influences which now interfered in the manage- ment of the Army, and with the selection for appointments and promotion, — interferences which would never be tolerated in any well-organised department of the Civil Service. He had spoken with the freedom that belonged to a private Member, but with the knowledge that official life had given him ; and he deemed it his highest duty while he could speak to lay these things before his fellow- countrymen." We firmly believe that these grave words are of vital import to the nation, but unless Sir Michael Hicks Beach will be more specific and will come to closer quarters with the question he raises, he will have done harm, not good. He will have produced a sense of alarm and insecurity in the public mind without having given the nation any aid in the essential work of doing away with the evil influences that destroy the efficiency of the Army, and so imperil the national welfare. Consider for a moment what Sir Michael Hicks Beach's words really mean. He tells us that we shall never reform the Army or the War Office until we remove "all those outside influences which now interfered in the management of the Army, and with the selection for appointments and promotion," and he emphasises this statement by telling us that such interference would never be tolerated in the Civil Service. What makes this state- ment so specially momentous is the fact that no one can say that Sir Michael Hicks Beach has never had a close and " inside " view of the War Office and the Army, and that he does not know what he is talking about. He does know. As Chancellor of the Exchequer for the past seven years he has had the most intimate knowledge of all that concerns the War Office, and has been able to watch its working far better and more effectually than the two statesmen who during that period have been actually immersed in all the detailed control and management of the machine. It would, in a word, be absolutely impossible to ob- tain a sounder and more instructed opinion than that of Sir Michael Hicks Beach on the working of the organisation charged with the duty of providing the national Army. And he tells us that we shall never reform the Army and the War Office unless we banish certain "outside influences." —But what is the use of Sir Michael Hicks Beach saying, that, unless he is prepared to tell us what those influences are P It is certain that he can tell us if he will, for he would never have committed himself to such a statement if he were not absolutely sure of his ground.
We have reached, then, this point in the long and heart- breaking controversy as to the Army and the War Office. First, the nation is fully aware that the state of the War Office and the Army is not what it should be, that vast sums of money are being spent without results propor- tionate to the expenditure, and that there is the most crying and immediate need for reform. Next, the nation, though knowing reform to be necessary, finds it impossible to procure reform because it cannot get any one to tell it what are the causes that have brought about the evil results which are so apparent, and what must be done to get rid of them. Finally, one of the nation's ablest and most trusted public servants, now free from the trammels of office, and a public servant who must know the facts, tells the nation half the truth,—tells it, that is, that certain influences exist which preclude reform, but fails to tell it what those influences exactly are. But how is it possible to get rid of those influences unless they are named and known, and so can be faced and overcome ? When a doctor states that certain bad influences in his bodily economy are preventing a patient's recovery, the patient immediately asks what those influences are, in order that he may eliminate them at once. So the nation in its need must not hesitate to ask Sir Michael Hicks Beach to indicate exactly what are those "outside influ- ences" which prevent reform in the Army and War Office, for till they are indicated nothing can be done to provide a zemedy. Surely Sir Michael Hicks Beach will not refuse to speak out, however disagreeable and painful it may be to him to do so. The nation owes him much already ; and we cannot believe that he will miss so great an opportunity of putting the coping-stone on his splendid record of public service. To make such a speech as that made at Bristol, to let the nation know that he is possessed of the knowledge of what is destioying the efficiency of its Army, and then to refuse to let the public have the benefit of that keowledge, would be utterly unworthy of Sir Michael Hicks Beach. He has never failed us before in courage and independence, and we cannot believe that he will fail us now. It is, therefore, with the fullest assurance that he will respond to the appeal that we respectfully ask Sir Michael Hicks Beach to tell, not us, of course, but the nation, plainly and openly, and in a way which cannot be misunderstood, what are those "out- side influences" to which he draws attention.
Even if originally Sir Michael Hicks Beach did not mean to give more than a hint as to the nature of the "outside influences" he named, believing that they would be guessed by the public, he will, we feel sure, now find it news- &try to speak out. And for this reason. His words have raised a crop of suspicions in every quarter, and suspicion clouds the mind of a nation with even worse results than it does that of an individual. It creates uneasiness, but it couples it with uncertainty, and therefore no relief can be had in action. At present some people are saying that Sir Michael Hicks Beach must have meant Court influences. Others are declaring that he meant female influences, and that he desired to indicate the truth of the stories so freely circulated at one time in-regard to the goodwill of "smart society women " being essential to the securing of promotion in the Army. Others, again, imagine that he meant that political influences were at work ; while others are wondering if the words must not be connected with rumours as to corruption in regard to war contracts. As to this last suspicion, we feel sure that Sir Michael Hicks Beach meant to make no allegation. Corruption is not the influence that injures our Army. If it exists at all, it is only in some very minor degree. Sir Michael Hicks Beach, we may be sure, means something very different from that. Again, it seems difficult to believe that he would have spoken in the way he did if he merely meant to refer to the social and female influences that are understood to have affected the War Office and the Army. Those have existed, and very likely exist now, and certainly should be abolished, but they are not, we should imagine, the " outside influences" of which Sir Michael Hicks Beach was speaking. His language was too grave and too serious in its character to indicate mere petticoat influence, which, however detestable, could hardly be dignified as "interference. There remain Court influence and political influence,— i.e., the influence exerted by political grandees and power- ful politicians generally. Which of these influences was meant, if either of them was meant, we cannot presume to say, for we can claim, of course, no " inside " knowledge of the matter. It is for Sir Michael Hicks Beach to speak. If it should turn out, however, that Sir Michael Hicks Beach, meant to indicate Court influence as the" outside influence which prevents reform, the nation must be prepared to face the matter, and to insist that the time has long passed for considering the national Army as the special and peculiar province of the Sovereign, in which the Court has rights overriding those of the nation. In the days of George IV. it used to be said, "It's the King's Army and the 'King's Navy, but it's the National Debt." That epigram has happily lost its force. The nation now claims something more than the privilege of paying the bill. Our is a national Army and a national Navy well as a nation a al Debt, and the nation would never m1 that it was Pm' eluded from giving itself an efficient Army because of certain old formulae as to the necessity for allowing the Sovereign a free hand in " his " Army. The people do not grudge the Monarchy its legitimate influence in the councils of the nation, and gratefully acknowledge the Sovereign's hard work and good work in the public interest; but it would be madness at the present time to assert the existence of an independent Royal power in regard to the Army. Nothing would more swiftly and surely imperil the stability of the Monarchy than the assertion of any such claim. Fortunately, no such claim is ever likely to be unduly pressed while the present Sovereign is on the throne. If it is found that the exercise of Court influence is forbidding reform in the Army, that influence, we feel certain, will be voluntarily abandoned. But, as we have said, we have no right to assume that it was Court influence in regard to which Sir Michael Hicks Beach directed his words until he has him- self come forward and told us what are the "outside influences" to which he referred. That he will so come forward and give the nation the benefit of h s knowledge we cannot doubt. To shrink back from the task of showing the nation how it may obtain true reform in the Army and the War Office would be wholly unworthy of his record. He has let the nation know that he possesses the knowledge which they must have if they are to insist on a real reform, and he cannot now withhold that knowledge.
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