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CHAPTER VI

THE POSITION ON THE YALU

I HAVE now got all the information immediately available about the Yalu fight, and my last two visits were especially useful. One was to Major‑General Inouye commanding the Twelfth Division, who told me interesting things about the musketry of the Russians and the adventures of the Fifth Company 24th Regiment. The other to Major‑General Watanabe, commanding the Second brigade of Guards, who was senior officer present at the Hamaton fight in the afternoon of May 1. He is a most charming person. He not only gave me a number of useful notes, but also an original sketch of the battle‑field which had been drawn for his own use, with all the dispositions of the troops marked upon it. I think then I am now in a position to form a fairly correct idea of the course of the battle, and I shall try and put it down as clearly as I can without going too much into detail.

Towards the end of April 1904 General Kaschtalinsky with some 6000 men at his back had taken up a defensive position across the Pekin road where it passes through the village of Chiuliencheng on the Yalu. Just over the water at Wiju stood Kuroki, busily engaged in bestowing the last touches to the First Army of Japan, that living key which the great

general staff at Tokio had so long been fashioning to fit the Manchurian lock.

With the possible exception of a final engagement, a first serious encounter is generally the most crucial. However insignificant the forces on either side may be, and however paltry the mere material losses and gains, the result must always profoundly influence the course of a war, not only by the effects produced on the morale of the fighting men, and on the prestige of their respective countries, but still more by offering the initiative to the victorious general. Indeed, when it is considered that the impending conflict was in this case to be between European and Asiatic types who bad never before joined battle, it must be admitted that it would be difficult to over‑estimate its importance.

,The Russian army is the largest on earth, as the hosts of the twentieth century are reckoned ; that of Japan is of moderate dimensions. The mere peace effectives of the Czar largely outnumber the mobilised war strength of the Mikado's troops. Yet, for this imminent battle of the Yalu‑the first in the history of the world, consciously watched by the whole of Asia‑the representative of the smaller army had brought with him to the point of contact a force seven times greater than that of his immediate opponent. Doubtless the Japanese commander was very much nearer his base, but still such an explanation does not cover all the ground, and I do not think any European or American would have ventured to predict, a few weeks previously, that the Russians would fight their first fight on Manchurian soil with a force only half the size of the army which that pariah of Government departments, the execrated British War Office, was able to concen

trate in one quarter of the time to take part in the battle of Mournful Monday before Ladysmith.

Before embarking upon an account of the fight I think some consideration should be given to the following points:

First: How did the Japanese realise the weakness of the Russians in Manchuria so much better than any European or American observers?

Secondly: Why did Kuropatkin send any troops to the. Yalu at all if he was not able to concentrate there in sufficient force?

Taking these points seriatim, it is instructive to contrast the attitudes of Great Britain and Japan towards the numerous recently published fairy‑tales on the subject of Russia, and her destiny in the furthest East. How often have we in England been assured by those who spoke with authority, that Russia had come to Manchuria to stay; that Manchuria was already Russia; that Fate and the Czar had so ordained, and that mere Anglo‑Saxons could only bow down before the accomplished fact 2?

We believed it. So often was the tale told, so respectable were the witnesses, that although a rebellious spirit may here and there have protested, yet, for the. Most part, it was accepted as incontestable, and one more trick was placed with a sigh to the credit of our chief rival in Asia. But Japan! Thoughtfully, attentively, Japan had weighed the evidence, and had come to a precisely contrary conclusion. If the full reasons for this divergence of opinion could be known, it would probably be found to lie, not so much in the superiority of

her diplomatic and military sources of information, as in a fundamental difference in the attitude of the two allied nations towards those sources. The Japanese

accept what their experts tell them. On the other hand, the average Anglo‑Saxon revolts at the very word expert, which is in itself an assumption that some one knows something better than he does. The one fortunate exception to this general rule is the navy. A trip to Margate on a breezy day has sufficed to convince the great " man in the street," by methods before which even his omniscience must bow, that he is out of his depth in matters nautical. He leaves them accordingly severely alone, and ' approves of his parliamentary representative following his example, thus giving all ranks a chance of escaping those periodic reorganisations which are to the spirit of the army what transplantation is to the vitality of a tree. Hence the efficiency of the British navy.

Be this as it may, Japan had weighed the power of Russia, and bad quite made up her mind about her own immediate future in the Far East‑a determination in which the future not only of Czardom, but even perhaps of Christendom, was also to be involved. The momentous decision was not signalized by bluster or fuss; on the contrary, as the fatal moment drew near she acknowledged the tension only by an accentuation of her customary suavity, till it reached a point which, to the Occidental perception, was indistinguishable from humility. Now, unless I very much misread the character of our allies, humility is a frame of mind which was, and always will be, very far from their hearts in dealing with any Western nation. Is it to be wondered at that Russia failed to realize how, under this depreciatory attitude, there lurked a fixed and desperate purpose to extract every single concession considered necessary to the future of Japan, or, at the given moment, to cry havoc and let loose the dogs of war?

The Japanese method only seems new because it is so very very old. Machiavellian Italy knew all about it, and it is unquestionably more gentlemanly and effective as a procedure than the bark‑without‑preparing‑tobite system of drifting towards war which prevails in England and America.

Just as Europe misunderstood the diplomatic attitude of Japan, so also she accepted without question exaggerations concerning the military strength of the Russians in the Far East. How easily did Russia obtain a full endorsement of all the statements of her agents from the Press and public of Western civilization! With what amused contempt did the Japanese listen both to the statements and their endorsements! I believe myself they served her purpose. At any rate, to the best of my belief she never bad the smallest idea of publishing the truth of the matter, even to the extent of taking her friends into her confidence. I had been a few weeks at Tokio when I was specially privileged at an interview, lasting several hours, to hear from the lips of a very great man what purported to be an exact account of the strength of the Russian forces. This account, technically called a distribution statement, gave the station and actual strength of every Russian unit east of Lake Baikal. It was for the month of October 1903, and there was also a supplementary document showing in detail the number of additional men, guns and horses which had arrived on the scene of operations between that period and the end of January 1904. I was surprised, not only at the masses of professedly precise figures which had been got together, but at the formidable strength of the Russians. There were supposed to be 180 full battalions of infantry, and with cavalry, artillery and engineers, the

total of the Russian forces in Manchuria came approximately to 200,000 men. I asked if I might communicate this long statement, and was told that I might do so as a very special mark of favor and of trust. Home went the statement, but, unfortunately, since I have come here I have ascertained that it was entirely misleading. I now know that at the very time I fondly imagined I was being taken into the intimate confidence of the highest authorities, the Japanese in the field knew well that the whole mobile field army at the command of the Russian Generalissimo would barely amount to 80,000 men by the 1st of May. All is fair in love and war, and it is something even to have gained the experience that the Japanese trust nobody.

Not only did our allies know the numbers at Kuropatkin's disposal, but they bad also made up their minds that it would be impossible for him to place a large proportion of these troops on the Yalu, because, first, they were satisfied that it would take some 3000 Chinese carts to maintain 30,000 Russians so far away from their regular communications, and these carts had not yet been collected; secondly, because they had too much belief in Kuropatkin's generalship and ability. Once the ports were free of ice it was incredible to them that he would venture to launch too large a proportion of his small field force upon distant adventures amongst the Manchurian mountains. A study of the map of Korea and Manchuria, even in an ordinary atlas, will make the position clear. Chiuliencheng lies at the extreme left flank of Kuropatkin's sea‑exposed frontier of 400 miles, a frontier which had very bad lateral communications. Had he committed the bulk of his small field army to the task of guarding the Yalu, then either an army from Japan or the first

army re‑embarking suddenly at Chulsan might have sailed for Newchwang and forestalled him at Kaiping, cutting the force on the Yalu from their communications as well as from the garrison of Port Arthur. Until the ice bad broken up, Kuropatkin's communications to the Yalu, or even to Anju, Pingyang, and the whole of the north of Korea, were perfectly safe. After that date he was bound to keep the main body of his comparatively small force in a central position.

To the strategist, indeed, the difficulty of grasping the scope of Kuropatkin's scheme lies, not so much in accounting for his having sent so few men to the Yalu, as in satisfactorily comprehending why he sent so many. No doubt it was highly desirable, from the Russian military point of view, to deny Manchuria's soil for as long as possible to the Japanese, not only on account of prestige but also because every day gained meant the advent of increased munitions and reinforcements by the Trans‑Siberian railway. But a retarding force of Cossacks, mounted infantry and horse artillery, such as ought to have been operating In Northern Korea during the months of March and April, might have done this without running too much risk, whilst infantry and field guns usually mean serious fighting, and if their numbers are insufficient they are very likely to get caught.

This brings me to my second point : Why did Kuropatkin send Sassulitch to Fenghuangcheng with a force too small to fight effectively, too big and too immobile to extricate itself creditably, when once it had come into contact with the enemy's superior forces ?

If in private life a sober quiet individual upsets all previous estimates of his character by marrying his cook, it is not necessary to say cherchez la femme,

because she stands there as large as life. Where a gross and palpable blunder in elementary strategy is made by a general of repute it should be equally unnecessary nowadays to seek for the statesman, who is usually quite apparent. It is difficult, no doubt, for a ruler of any sort to restrain himself from interference with his instruments. Thus, in the old days, theologians, having the power, used it for the purpose of routing the ungodly, as at Dunbar and many other places, where the result was good for the ungodly. Still, the Church could at least sometimes inspire the soldiery with individual fanaticism which might compensate for much bad direction. Per contra, the statesman has nothing in his gift but disaster so soon as be leaves his own business of creating or obviating wars, and endeavors to conduct them. The American War, for instance, was a war where the feebly timorous civilian strategy of the Federals was a perpetual and never‑failing standby to its weaker adversary; whilst the greatest victory the North ever scored was when Jefferson Davis took a leaf out of Lincoln's book, and bad the ineptitude to replace that competent, sagacious, careful commander Joseph E. Johnston by a mere thrusting divisional general, infinitely his inferior in all the higher attributes of generalship.

South Africa yields another and a more recent example. The detachment of a force of all arms to Dundee in 1899 was exactly parallel to the detachment of a force of all arms to the Yalu in 1904; and there is little reason to doubt that these two examples of civilian strategy were urged upon responsible commanders for similar reasons, which probably seemed unimpeachable to those who put them forward.

Civil authority in Natal declared that if Dundee was evacuated, British prestige would be lowered amongst the Dutch ; the Kaffirs would become restive, and Durban would be cut off from some useful coal mines. Substitute Manchus and Chinese for Dutch and Kaffirs, and timber concessions for coal mines, and the reasons given to Sir George White are identical the those which

by the Viceroy of Excellent reasons in their way, but in each case the soldier's opinion was right, although for political purposes it had to give way to the judgment of a Governor or Viceroy. The fact is, that a big soldier must be potentially if not actually a statesman. Who now questions which was the more far‑seeing statesman, Montcalm or Vaudreuil ? The idea that a soldier should be a

mere bulldog, to attack unreflectingly at the moment and manner decreed by the politician, will find no warrant in common sense or in history. More than one

soldier has failed from not restaging this truth, and I believe that statesmen also have even more frequently failed to realize that when once they have enunciated the policy they must leave the soldier a free band to carry out that policy. To borrow another example from the American Civil War, Lincoln was entirely within his rights as a statesman in insisting upon the. importance of safeguarding Washington. He restaged that if it fell into the hands of the Confederates, England and France might take steps to break the

blockade, and to pour arms, supplies, and, perhaps, even volunteers into the South. Where Lincoln was mistaken was in attempting to dictate to McClellan and other Generals how Washington was to be defended. The Japanese are quite clear and decided I

were given, so say the Japanese, Manchuria to General Kuropatkin.

in their theories on this interesting subject, and applying them to the situation on the Yalu seem to take it for granted that it was entirely the pressure brought to bear by Alexieff which forced Kuropatkin to detach a considerable and yet insufficient part of his force to the Korean northern frontier.

Returning to the Yalu, and accepting the Japanese estimates, it seems that in the latter part of April 1904, Lieut.‑ General Sassulitch with 15,000 infantry, 5000 cavalry, and 60 guns as his total available force in the triangle, Fenghuangcheng, Antung, Changsong, had deputed Kaschtalinsky with 6000 men and 30 guns to entrench himself on the north bank of the river in the neighbourbood of its junction with the Aiho. There it had been decreed by fate that it would be his duty, alone and practically unsupported, to give the much‑needed fillip to Russian prestige by disputing the passage of those rivers with a Japanese army of over 40,000 men, having at its back twenty howitzers in addition to its own full complement of artillery. Not that supports were altogether out of reach. As far as the Japanese know, the balance of the 20,000 men under Sassulitch was distributed as shown on Map II, and as the bulk of them were within twelve miles of Chiuliencheng, it seemed that a concentration to oppose a crossing at that place would be easy. Easy or not, it was absolutely essential to the Russians to effect it, seeing that even with the most complete concentration the force was still too weak for the task which had been assigned to it.

On the 4th April reconnaissance patrols of Japanese cavalry had visited WiJu and Yongampho, and were followed by the advance guard of the army under MajorGeneral Asada, which commenced its entrance into Wiju

on the 8th. This advance guard had started as a full brigade, but insuperable difficulties of supply and transport had left headquarters no option but to reduce its strength considerably. Part of the brigade was accordingly halted at Kasan, five days' march from the Yalu; and the actual strength of the advance guard, which commenced coming into WiJu by driblets on the 8th and was not concentrated there till the 13th, was only two batteries of artillery, one regiment of cavalry, and one regiment of infantry. These facts are sufficiently surprising. No one dares do these things at manceuvres, and yet when empires are at stake they are not only done but they succeed. For some days after the concentration of this feeble detachment at WiJu there were no other Japanese troops within supporting distance. General Kuroki was well aware of the serious danger he was running. When the Japanese headquarters were at Pingyang the question of this advance had been earnestly debated. It was known the Russians had boats on the Yalu; but the anxious question was, whether they bad a sufficient number of them to build a bridge when the ice broke up, which it did just as the advance guard reached Kasan. It was during this debate at Pingyang that the lines of communications staff announced that the full brigade must be reduced if the force was to go further, and it seemed to several of the junior staff officers to be tempting fate to push a weak detachment into the very jaws of the Russians if those jaws were capable of closing upon it. Eventually the headquarters decided to take the risk, although they have confessed to me that the evidence before them rather tended to show that the Russians had the means of crossing if they were anxious to do so. The fact was that, unless the point of the advance

guard pushed on, the Japanese must have delayed almost indefinitely the carrying out of a general scheme, whose details down to its Very dates had already been worked out at Tokio. For the main body of the army was not able to get on at all until Chulsan could be made good as a port for the disembarkation of stores, provisions, heavy guns, &c., and to cover Cbulsan it was essential that the Asada detachment should be thrust out well to the front, though whether quite as far as Wiju seems very much open to question. When I have questioned the Japanese on this point they have usually ended by admitting that their only valid excuse for taking such a risk lay in their estimate of the inertia of the enemy.

On the north bank of the river, actually within cannon shot of this unsupported Japanese detachment of 2000 infantry, 500 cavalry and 12 guns, were 6000 Russian infantry, 1000 cavalry and 30 guns. The Russians had been long in the neighbourhood, and should have had perfect channels of information. They bad drawn all the native boats to their own bank, and the Yalu offered no serious obstacle to an offensive movement against a weak detachment. If they thought their force insufficient, they could within twenty‑four hours have doubled their infantry and guns and trebled their cavalry. Here was a chance for the lieutenants of Kuropatkin 1 Fortune was in a mood to be wooed, and be who worships at her shrine dares never let his anxious gaze wander for one moment from those opportunities which are the fugitive smiles of the goddess.

It was not to be. Not until April 12‑four days, that is to say, after the Japanese advance guard had begun to come in to Wiju‑did the Russians make even a semblance of an attempt to grasp the initiative,

which was slipping hourly away through their fingers. When the attempt was made, the scale upon which it was conducted proved that they bad hardly risen to the situation. A party of some fifty of their men came close up to the town and tried to cross by boat. One company of Japanese infantry drove them off easily, killing an officer and a private soldier. The officer was Lieutenant Demidrovitch, of the 12th Regiment, and on him was found a written order telling him to pass through the Japanese outpost line and reconnoitre south of Wiju. My Japanese friends tell me that every one felt sorry for the poor young fellow, ordered to undertake with 50 men a duty which his General had hesitated to carry out with 6000.

This episode of the advance guard of the First Army is one, which possesses an exceptional interest of its own. Is it not, after all, as easy to see the distinguishing marks of national character in a skirmish as in a battle, and even sometimes in an abstention as much as in an action? The loss of such a chance by the Russian commander will bring home to officers and men who have served in South Africa more forcibly than any lengthy treatise the gulf which separates the Muscovite from the Boer. It is quite certain that if Delarey, Botha, DeWet, Smuts, or many less distinguished Boer leaders, had been in command on the north bank of the Yalu, the small Japanese detachment marching from Kasan would either have been attacked on its way to Wiju, or, having been permitted to arrive, would have had to fight for its life against every enemy within a radius of thirty miles long before any troops of its main army could have got within supporting distance.

I confess then that the hesitation of the Russians to take advantage of such an opening is to me more con

vincing augury of the ultimate success of the Japanese than any showy crossing of the Yalu river to the thundering accompaniment of 4 vastly superior artillery. Looking at the matter purely from the point of view of autumn manceuvres, a minor Russian success at this stage would have made the subsequent situation much less of a foregone conclusion and infinitely more interesting. As a soldier, therefore, I must own to a sentiment of professional regret that Kaschtalinsky did not enrich military history by leading his force, whilst yet there was time, to deliver a blow at this isolated advance guard of Asada's.

On 20th April the whole of the First Army had completed its concentration in the neighbourhood of Wiju without any hindrance or difficulties beyond those, provided, somewhat bountifully it must be admitted, by nature. The enemy, having been passive when a great reward lay well within the grasp of their initiative, was not likely to give trouble now that the superiority of force had passed very definitely from the northern to the southern bank of the river. Still, although all danger of a Russian attack had now disappeared, it was very desirable to prevent Sassulitch from concentrating opposite Wiju to oppose the crossing. He could do this in twelve hours, or less, and the careful Japanese wanted a full ten days to complete all arrangements before delivering their blow. Nothing was to be left to chance. Fords were to be sounded, mountain paths explored, redoubts built against the possibility of a counter attack; timber, nails, cables, anchors were to be collected for bridges, and, in fact, every little detail was to be gone into and rehearsed so that, when the curtain rang up, the actors should be in their places and word‑perfect at least.

Whilst all this was in progress Sassulitch must remain spread out over twenty‑five miles of front, uncertain where the crossing would take place. It seemed a difficult thing to manage, but it was done. The detachment under Major‑ General Sasaki at Changsong, thirty miles up the river, helped to cause uneasiness regarding the extreme Russian left, and on the other flank the navy was called in to make demonstrations at Antung. The depth of the channel would not permit even light‑draught armed launches or torpedo‑boats to ascend the river beyond that part, but the appearance of a certain naval activity seems to have had its effect, and the Russians remained dispersed in face of the concentrated Japanese. In an early entry I wrote about the improvised avenues of trees by which the Japanese concealed the movement of troops and supplies along their lines of communications; and with the same end in view, strict orders were issued that neither officer nor man of the First Army was on any account to show himself on the high ground which ran along the southern bank of the Yalu. Very different ideas prevailed on the north side of the river, where the natural keenness of the soldiers to see something of their enemies was not in any way controlled. Consequently, the crests of the hills above the Russian position were habitually lined with spectators staring across the river, in the hope of being able to satisfy their curiosity. So little did the Russians trouble themselves about concealment , that they even permitted their men to water the horses in the Aiho between 2 and 4 P.M., and to exercise them on the sandy flats which extend between the north bank of that river and the Russian position at the base of the hills. All this was highly tantalising to the Japanese artillery, who lay

under cover watching their enemies play about within range of their guns, like a fox‑terrier forbidden to bark at the rabbits lest it should prematurely frighten the careless gambolling creatures before all the nets are in position.

The plan of battle was arranged long before the army left Japan. It was even settled that the Twelfth Division on the right should advance through the mountainous triangle between the Yalu and the Aiho and turn the enemy's left; although the sweep of this turning movement, and whether it should keep touch with the rest of the army or work clear of it down the Kuantienchen road, was left to be decided on the spot. No doubt the Japanese had alternative plans; but their main plan, the plan most carefully studied and relied upon, was brought with them from Japan and put into execution without essential modification on 1st May. The rear‑guard action of Hamaton was of course unforeseen, and is therefore the more interesting military operation of the two, as extempore effort makes demands upon qualities of a very different order from those which are employed in elaborate and studious preparations.

The position which the Russians had prepared in order to oppose the crossing of the Yalu was about twenty‑four miles in length, having its right three or four miles to the west of Antung, its centre at Chiuliencheng, and its left thrown back along the Aiho to a point a mile or two north of Sheechong. The defending force for these latter two sections of Sassulitch's line had its right resting on Chiuliencheng, whence the troops were fairly equally distributed to the top of the hill just north of Ishiko. Thence to Sheechong there were only small detached posts, as the

country was so bad that it was not thought likely the Japanese would choose such a spot for a crossing. At 'Sheechong the right bank of the Aiho was again. Strongly held to guard against a Japanese turning movement on Hamaton down the Kuantienchen road. These exact dispositions only became known to the Japanese after the battle. To understand such a position and the movements which took place, it is absolutely necessary to study Map II., whereon are placed the works, bridges, and dispositions of the troops ,according to the information I have received. This saves hard writing and harder reading. Especially is this the case in the description of a battle fought on the Korean frontier; for here, on the border, Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, and Russians have each made it a ‑ point of honour to inflict their own special nomenclature on the innocent riverain hamlets, and in so doing have seemed to take a special delight in removing their renderings, as far as consonants and vowels can go, from those which have been adopted by their rivals.

To return to the position. The plain or valley which forms a bed for the Yalu and Aiho' with their main and subsidiary channels, averages about four miles across. It consists of smooth white sand, or ‑sandy plough, and except where some trees and brushwood grow on Osekito and Kinteito islands, it gives no cover of any description, excepting what may be, obtained here and there from the bank of one of the channels. In other words, the Russians had an exceptional field of fire; indeed it would be impossible to find, a better. Their shelter trenches ran along the base of the spurs just where they began their rise out of the sandy river bed on the right or northern bank of the Aiho, and had a command of some twenty or thirty feet

over the level plain. These spurs ran down towards the river from higher hills further north, and they ended for the most part in an under feature or knoll from 100 to 300 feet in heights, which sloped steeply down to the sand. The hills were, generally speaking, bare and rocky, although here and there a little low scrub or a few trees gave natural cover. Artificial cover in the shape of rifle pits and short lengths of concealed trench might very easily have been worked in amongst the broken ground and hollows along the, face of the hills, and defenses of this description would have been very difficult to detect even at a distance of a few hundred yards. The Russians bad not chosen to make this use of the ground, and had preferred to construct long straight sections of simple and extremely conspicuous breastwork riveted with boughs. Thereby they threw away the advantage given them by the broken rocky ground. Such conspicuous simple entrenchments might equally well, or perhaps better, have been made a little way out on the smooth bed of the river, where both shrapnel and high explosive shell would have lost much of their effect in the soft sand.

A portion of the Russian artillery was prepared to come into action in the open, but evaulements had been constructed for twelve guns just above Chiuliencheng on the top of a low hill. The Russian engineer or artilleryman who designed this target must have taken his idea from his grandfather's text‑book. The guns were in three lines one behind the other, an antique device for getting a very heavy fire on a very restricted front, but one which, in modern war, ensures that shells long fused for the first row will surely catch either the second or the third. There was a flimsy parapet, just

enough to attract attention, not enough to give cover, and there was no trench or place of refuge for the personnel. Nothing could have been worse, for the great essential nowadays in any such prepared positions is sunken, shell‑ proof cover for the men, and after that, cover from sight, and, as much as possible, from shot, for the guns. But let no British officer cast a stone or be sarcastic on this score. For our own ideas were precisely similar until the South African War came to make us more cunning.

The chief strength of the position as it was used by the Russians lay, first, in its excellent field of fire; secondly, in the Alho, which ensured the delay of the attacking force just where the fire of the defenders should have begun to be deadly. This river, 100 yards wide and four to five feet deep, runs at a distance of from 300 to 800 yards from the Russian position along its whole length. It served to the Chiuliencheng position much the same purpose as the Tugela did to the Colenso position, and indeed the general resemblance between these two defensive lines has impressed itself strongly upon every one who has seen both battle‑fields. In either case there was the same open field of fire from which the steep hills rose abruptly, the same difficult river to cross within easy, sometimes point‑ blank range from the riflemen in the trenches at the base of the hills, and, most curious resemblance of all, the same commanding hill on the left flank of the position, which was on the wrong side of the river from the point of view of the defense. Tiger Hill was to the Russians exactly what Hlangwane was to the Boers. It should not have taken two minutes to see

Russians an injustice. merely alternative positions.

The positions prepared in rear were probably

that, especially from the Russian point of view, Tiger Hill was the key to the position; but it is not easy for the British, who too ' k two months to recognise similar properties in Hlangwane, to make any criticism.

The Yalu is much more important, geographically and commercially, than the Aiho, the southern stream being 250 yards, and the main stream nearly 400 yards in breadth, both being unaffordable. In regard to this battle, however, the larger river played a subordinate part, although it lent its name to the conflict. By daylight on 30th April it had ceased to interpose between the Russian left wing and the Japanese Twelfth Division, and it was crossed without fighting during the night of 30th April ‑1st May by the Guards and Second Division. So long as the Russian defense remained passive, the Yalu, lying beyond rifle shot from their trenches, was bound to subside into an obstacle merely physical, once the artillery on the northern bank was silenced.

I think I have now given as complete a description of the position as is necessary to complement the excellent map; but it is worth while, perhaps, to explain that its northern section, which became the actual battlefield, possessed two very obvious outposts, on which good entrenchments and vigorous active defenders might have caused the Japanese a great deal of embarrassment in all their preliminary arrangements. The first of these was Chukodai village, on the Yalu, between that river and the Aiho. It completely commanded the main road between Wiju and Chiuliencheng, and, as it turned out, its garrison must have been expelled before the Japanese could have established their artillery on Kinteito island during the night of 30^th April. The second, Tiger Hill, was a rocky tongue

or promontory, the extreme point of the triangle of mountains which divided the Aiho and the Yalu. It was supposed by the Koreans to resemble a crouching tiger looking down the river, and stood full 250 feet above their beds at the point where they united.

As I have already suggested, this rocky hill was more than an outpost; it was actually the key to the position. As long as the Russians held it they could sweep the valley of the Yalu with their artillery for 6000 yards below Wiju and render a daylight crossing practically impossible. In the hands of the Japanese it could be used as a pivot from which to operate against either flank or the centre of the Russian position. It was safeguarded against a coup de main by the unaffordable Yalu, and if it had been crowned with semi permanent defensive works, the whole of the Japanese scheme of operations must, in my opinion, have been recast. The Russians do appear to have appreciated the peculiar tactical value of Tiger Hill under the stress of an impending attack, when they, too late, endeavored to dig a few trenches. But it is strange indeed that the Russians, during their six weeks' occupation, should have neglected to fortify it strongly. Had they done so the Japanese must have experienced much delay, difficulty and loss in taking it, and must also have plainly shown their hand, whereby the eyes of Sassulitch might have been opened, and the balance of his force moved up in time to dispute the crossing of the Aiho. For, as it is the aim of the commander of the attack to throw a great superiority of force suddenly upon some vital point, or key, in his enemy's position, so the aim of the commander of the defense is to thwart this intention by transferring a correspondingly powerful force (according to his means)

from points merely threatened to the decisive spot. The role of the defender is, to my mind, the hardest to accomplish brilliantly. He needs both imagination and iron determination. Imagination to divine the full intention of his enemy from his preliminary movements ; determination to change his dispositions forthwith, regardless of the long faces of his disapproving staff, and despite the outcry of the subordinates who lose a portion of their troops. For it may be taken as an axiom that all local commanders are firmly convinced, always, that it is upon them that then brunt of the fighting is destined to fall.

The key to a position is a portion of the line of defence, the possession of which enables the defender to bold his ground, but which, once taken by the attacker, forces the defense to abandon the whole position and retreat. The village of Froschwiller, at the battle of Woerth, is a well‑known example. Tactically such a " key " may be a ridge from which guns can render all other positions within five miles untenable; or it may be a point from which the enemy's communications can be threatened, or which gives access to supplies, or enables a hand to be held out to friends; or it may possess any other important recommendations, material moral, which may easily be imagined. One advantage of being on the offensive is that occasionally a commander has the privilege of declaring what suit is o be trumps‑i.e., he declares a certain part of the enemy’s position to be the key 'merely by attacking t. This is notably the case where the line of defense s a river running through flat country, as the assailant hen fights for a decisive point wherever he attempts o cross it. When the real line of defense is broken

found beyond the river, to which the river only forms

a protective shield, this theory, of course, only holds good to a more limited extent.

The front of the Russian position along the Yalu was twenty‑four miles in length, but the Japanese attacked only its left section, extending from Chiulienchencr to the extreme Russian left near Sheechong on the Aiho, a distance of six or seven miles. The presence of eight battalions, twenty‑four guns, and several thousand Russian cavalry in the neighbourbood of Antung did not help the seven battalions and thirty guns on the Chiuliencheng‑Sheechong line in their defense of the passage of the river between those points. The Russians, in short, were trying to hold too long a line for their force; and unless their Intelligence Department and the prescience of their General warranted the fullest confidence that they would be able to concentrate so as to forestall the Japanese attempt to cross with their whole force, they would have done better to content themselves from the first with holding Antung and Hamaton, and with merely watching the upper reaches of the river with a line of outposts. The Russians, in short, might with great advantage have copied Lee's dispositions for guarding the river before the battle of Fredericksburg, ‑namely, a series of strong detachments so placed as to be able to concentrate rapidly, and anticipate the enemy at any threatened point, while the whole length of the river line was patrolled with cavalry. If my memory serves me right, the length of river to be watched namely, twenty‑four miles‑was much the same in either instance.

I feel I have been dabbling too long on the brink of the Yalu, and that I must pull myself together and dash in. First though, for just about as much time as

it would take me to pull off my boots and stockings, I pause to summaries the Russian military situation on the eve of this, the first land engagement of the war.

1. The strength of Kuropatkin's field army was less than half of what it was supposed to be by the outside world.

2. He was unable to send as much as one‑third of this field army to the Yalu.

3. Less than one‑half of the Russian troops actually on the Yalu were, thus far, concentrated opposite the concentrated Japanese army to dispute the passage of the river.

4. The handful of men who were actually on the ground prepared to fight what may well turn out to have been one of the decisive battles of the world, were not generally considered Russia's best troops, or a fair representative sample of her army, although certainly in the actual event they tried most gallantly to do their duty.