In the Lords on Monday Lord Roberts moved a resolution
expressing dissatisfaction with the inadequate military arrangements of the Government for the defence of this country and our oversee Dominions. Lord Roberts, in a long and able speech, maintained that the new forces were not, and could not be, better than the old. The Regular Army had been reduced, and in place of the ideal of a " Nation in Arms," we had less than 270,000 men, all practically untrained. Lord Roberts proceeded to show that the four conditions on the fulfilment of which the success of Lord Haldane's scheme depended—viz., that the requisite number would be found to come forward voluntarily ; that we must have command of the sea; that the invading force would not consist of more than 70,000 men ; and that the expeditionary force would be kept in the country for six months after war had been declared, during which time the home defence army could be trained—cannot be fulfilled. We wanted a million men to secure our position, and the experience of modern warfare proved that arms of precision and altered formations enhanced the need of diseipline and training. Lord Roberts concluded by urging the appointment of a small impartial commission of experts to inquire into the
condition of the Army, and reminded those who laid stress on the present pacific outlook that similar views were widely entertained and expressed in the year 1851—the year in which he got his commission—though there was not a single year in the next two decades that was not marked by some war in one portion of the globe or another.
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