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    584 The Leader and Saturday Analyst. [Ju...

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    INDIA..—MILITARY CHANGES. AT present, ou...

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    The National Defence Question. Rational ...

    between ; there was an extent of , I think , five or six miles to land upon;— -then certainly the operation "was beautifully con--dueted ; - —6 , 000 men sprang on shore , and all jumped out of the boats at once . ' - ' Sir John does- not believe the-, landing in the Crimea could have been effected if the Russians had properly contested it ; and be observes that light guns , even threepoimders , will sink boats quite as well as heavier artillery , and such guns , on Armstrong's principle , can easily be carried from place to place . It is remarkable that Sir John BuuGOYNE is as unwillinsr as other old-school officers to

    meet the case fairly , and look upon arming and training the people as the only way out of the difficulty . If a French army were landed on our coasts , he believes it would at once make for London , " where success would put an end to the war ; " and he coolly adds , "If you could keep them from London for a month or two , you would make a very good fight of it , I have no doubt . " The country cannot be satisfied to " make a good fight of it" after a delay that would

    ruin half the commercial firms in the kingdom , and so destroy credit as to bring all provisions to a famine price . Nothing short of a moral certainty of rapid success in operations of defence can be held sufficient , and there is but one way to obtain this—namely , by a general . arming and training of all the ablebodied men willing to lend their aid . Such projects as fortifying Shooter's Hill are only fit for the honesty of Newgate or the intelligence of "Bedlam .

    No artificial structures can equal the natural fortifications of our country . It is the Government , and the Government only , that stands in the way of our having a countless host of trained defenders ; and good officers would convert our hills , hedges , and copses into far better lines of defence than any costly apparatus of permanent works . Nothing , however , should be left to chance , or to the last moment . All approaches to the metropolis , and to every city of importance , should be surveyed with reference to a good plan of , action , and volunteers and regulars should -have districts assigned to them , so that no time should be lost . We have officers quite competent to arrange the whole thing with the greatest facility ; but we fear they are not in favour with the red-tape mediocrities who occupy-the War ^ office , nor with the parasites who disgrace the Court .

    584 The Leader And Saturday Analyst. [Ju...

    584 The Leader and Saturday Analyst . [ June 2 . 3 , I 860 .

    India..—Military Changes. At Present, Ou...

    INDIA .. —MILITARY CHANGES . AT present , our local regular army of India consists of 239 , 333 men . Of these , i , 9 S 0 are officers , and 13 , 884 European privates . This number is exclusive of the Queen ' s troops and of irregular forces . By an Act passed last session , the Government was empowered to raise 30 , 000 European troops , mid ~ foTm ^ hem-tre ^ e- ^ st ^ n ^ of all arms ; but Sir Charles Wood has asked for leave to bring iu a Bill to repeal the Act . It is the intention of the Government to have in India no local force of Europeans , but the regular army administered by the Horse Guards . The

    Government in India , in like manner , proposes that the whole local native force , regular and irregular , horse and foot , shall be put down , and a constabulary substituted , so that Her . Majesty ' s troops will constitute the entire military garrison of India . We can hardly believe that such a scheme is contemplated to the extent signified , and still less that it will ever be carried into execution . At the same time , it is so confidently announced by the Council in India , in Parliament , and by journals of which the influence is great in proportion to the ignorance of the general public on , such a subject , that we are compelled to notice it . . .

    Our empire in India was won by men who studied on the spot the means of conquest . No expedition ever went forth from our shores for this purpose . The adventurers , who , in time accomplished the great work , were traders ; and , though they were occasionally assisted by the national forces , as Prance contended against England in India for superiority as she contended in America , they achieved the conquest in the main by their own means . They studied the character and disposition of tho

    natives , and , used them to subjugate their country . The work was done rather by art than force . The majority of the soldiers by wliich Cliyje and Hastings , gained their great . . victories consisted of natives . When our traders went thither , they found India occupied by conquerors , quarrelling about their booty . They found , too , the natives divided into castes , amongst which Was a numerous military caste , bearing something of a sacred character , which lived and could only live by bearing iwms . That easto furnished them with soldiers . , It had been so

    employed by the Mussulman conquerors of India , and those who hacf to contend against them found their tools in the Kohillos and others . Having merged all patriotism in superstition , their sword was commanded by the best paymaster . The nvt which

    gained victories , crowned them with rewards . It was , in fact , nothing new that the masterdom over India should be gained and maintained by . a foreign race , using its own children for the purpose ! Our trading adventurers won an empire , preserved and extended it by deferring to the prejudices of the natives . They stooped to conquer—followed , as Bubke says all rulers must , in order to lead , * and were successful beyond example . A totallv different line of policy is to be pursued by our

    Treasury officials . They are to retain the country , conquered by the help of the people , in spite of them , and ostentatiously avow their object . Sir Charles Wood , about the humblest of loquacious and routine statesmen , is to reverse the policy of Olive and Hastings , Wkllesley , and their successors . That the natives cannot now be managed like their forefathers ; that the Sepoys , renowned through a whole century for unswerving fidelity , have mutinied , been disbanded , and decimated ; that the Government of Tndia has become involved in difficulties , and European

    residents have been the victims of terrible excesses , is more due to our inattention to the principles by which the natives were first trained to our service , than to any change in their character . If they have grown presumptuous , we have grown careless . Both might be in degree reckless . There is no evidence of any change in the men , there is abundant evidence of gross negligence in the authorities . These have left the regiments ' without ¦ adequateofficers ; they have not watched over discipline , and have lost the art of training the men to obedience . Nor is the fact without significance , that . the same class of men , especially our military authorities , and authorities in everv part of the empire , have

    declined in efficiency . They have not in them the soul ot improvement , and only improve from external compulsion . The late disastrous mutiny , with all its dire consequences , was the fruit of their mismanagement , rather than of vice in the men . The judgment is hasty and erroneous which condemns them instead of our officials , and * from one frightful example jumps to the conclusion that a native military force can no longer be relied on . It ought to be 7 with the " 7 additional cai-e and precautions of which late events have taught us the necessity . To break up the system by which an empire was won , instead of renovating it after it has been allowed to degenerate , is to run with the causes that hasten

    decay . ' Instead of ¦ arming- and brigading the natives to serve us ,, they are to be taxed , merely to pay the European force which is to keep them obedient . This is the vulgar notion of routine and vulgar statesmen . At the same time they are expected to believe that the new system , which shuts them out from power , neither flatters their prejudices , nor conforms to their social policy , is for their benefit . A few money-making bankers and dealers may find their account in the new system , ¦ . and , thftir support may encourage similar men in \ n ruinous

    course . We should like to be informed how Government expects the disbanded troops will be disposed of . How can the caste , doomed to arms , find other occupations ? Can it be absorbed , as the comparatively few soldiers disbanded from time to time , on the cessation of war , are absorbed in Europe , into the mass of the miscellaneous population ? Is it not rather more likely that the superstition which destroys patriotism , will now be for the military caste a bond of Union ? Will not the disbanded soldiery be driven to unite in self-defence ? May not the alternative for them be conquest or starvation ? And may we not expect that by excluding them from military scrvici ' , we shall increase the force to be subdued , and shall carve but for our

    own troops more work than they can perform '? The new system will enlist a vast population , no longer divided under many rulers , and easily communicating one with another , against us ; while the old system enlisted the better and an always increasing part in our service . The new course sneina eminently dangerous , and our children , if not ourselves , will have to deplore the delusion which induced us to substitute ; as the principle of our Indian rule the arrogant ignorance of Canon Row for the deferential knowledge of Leadenhall Street . The great empire was won by deferring to the social institutions of the Hindoos , and what then may we expect from a policy which sets them at defiance ?

    The consequences of this threatened change in the military means bywhich we are ^ ^ l 10 me " It implies a permanent addition to the standing army , nnd to the power of the Horse Guards , of at least 80 , 000 men to replace the Indo-European troops . If the plnn be carried out to-the full extent mentioned , another 30 , 000 men , with-nil the . staff appointments belonging to such n body , will scarcely suffice , however skilfully they may be handled , to secure , our dominion in Tivlia . A permanent addition of at least < 50 , 000 , if not 90 , 000 men , or oven more , will be made to our army , officered as it yet is nnd likely to be exclusively by the connections of the aristocracv , and perverted , as it ever has

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), June 23, 1860, page 4, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_23061860/page/4/