LORD DERBY'S SCHEME. N OW that Lord Derby's admirable plan of
campaign is not only before the public but in operation, it may interest our readers to be reminded of an article which we wrote just a year ago—i.e., November 7th, 1914—entitled " Scientific Recruiting." That article, curiously enough, anticipates Lord Derby's scheme in very many matters even of detail. When we say this we are not suggesting for a moment that Lord Derby took his scheme from the back files of the Spectator, either consciously or unconsciously. In the rush of the war very few people's memories go back a year. What we venture to say has made the authorities adopt the scheme outlined by us last year is the force of circumstances. We had the prescience, or shall we say the good luck to think out what must be the inevitable result of the need for men. We needed men aud we were getting them in a haphazard way last year, but we felt sure that the need would continue, and that the force of circumstances would ultimately drive us to adopt a scientific and economic, and not a haphazard, and therefore wasteful, form of recruiting. This is exactly what has happened. We are at last trying " scientific recruiting," aud, as we most sincerely hope and believe, trying it before it is too late.
In our article of November 7th, 1914, we asked the question " What is meant by scientific recruiting ? " and answered it in the following way :- " We mean, in the first place, bringing home to every single man of military ago in the country the imperative need for his aid. This has as yet never boon done systematically and personally. At a General Election in every constituency in the country not only ono, but two, and sometimes three, personal appeals are made to every voter without any sort of difficulty, either through the post or by actual canvassing. But surely what we can do in the delirium of party politics we can do in a moment of national peril. We must so organize our recruiting appeals that every man of military ago shall have the straight question put to him, if necessary by a personal visit Will you do your duty ? '
The article next proceeded to suggest the doing of what was done under the Registration Act—i.e., the enrolment of the whole nation :— " This moans, of course, that we must first prepare—a task of no great difficulty—a muster of the men of military ago (such a muster was made just before the Armada), and then ask them squarely and fairly. When this has been done we shall know exactly how wo stand. If we do not get enough men to come forward, then we must, in the words which have become familiar to all who are conversant with the matter at first hand, go and fetch them."
Next we dealt with the difficulty of too great an inrush of men at one particular moment, and dealt with it very much on Lord Derby's lines :- "What objections would tho military authorities be likely to offer to this proposal ? Wo can guess very well what they would be. The authorities would say that under the system we propose there would be a groat danger of a tremendous rush of men, and of the War Office being overwhelmed with recruits for whom as yet they have no equipment and no moans of training. ' You would break us down utterly and ruin the scheme by your very success. If we are to do our duty by the mon, wo want to have a. steady flow of recruits, and not wild rushes that flood us out.' And hero let us interject that no words are too strong in praise of the way in which Lord Kitchener and his Staff are training and equipping the recruits. it is v. perfect marvel of good organization, good sense, humanity, and a fine mixture of the best military and democratic spirit. In a word, wo fully sympathize with the objection as to swampineb the War Office with men. Wo perfectly understand that for the hard-worked mon who aro now engaged in the task of training the distraction of having masses of raw material dumped upon them when they cannot deal with it would be as exasperating as it would be for a newspaper office to have the paper-makers coming at the busiest moment and dumping huge bales of paper in every corner of the composing- room and the editorial department. To run the thing efficiently., say the soldiers, the men must come in as they are wanted, and not before—just as the paper must come in when it its wanted for the newspaper, and not before. It would be madness to paralyse the military authorities and ruin the absolutely splendid work which they are doing for the nation by overfeeding them with recruits. In other words, we are fully aware that many businesses have been ruined by too great success at the wrong moment and by overtrading. Now what does all this point to ? It points most emphatically—and hero we are certain that every experi- enced man of business and every successful administrator will boar us out—to this fact. The provision of the men, and their training and organization, must be separate tasks and placed in separate hands. As wo have pointed out so often in those columns, the proper way to do the job is to leave the training and equip- ment of the men absolutely and unreservedly in the hands of the military authorities."
Again, we may claim to have anticipated not only Lord Derby's scheme but Lord Derby's office, except that we made it plural instead of singular. Lord Derby is in him- self our " Commission of Array," and it very excellent Commission. Indeed, he may be said to reach the ideal condition of a Commission or Committee—i.e., " a Com- mittee of one." Further, we anticipated Lord Derby's main proposition, that it was the business of himself and his civilian helpers to provide the raw material, but to leave all questions of training entirely to the soldiers :— "At the same time there ought to be set up an entirely separate body or 'Commission of Array; or, if that is thought too archaeo- logical, a body of Commissioners for Recruitile-c; whose first business it should be to muster the nation, work out tho quotas, and then, under the voluntary system, to got ready the raw material in groat heaps, but away from, and so as to cause no embarrassment to, the military authorities. That done, what would happen would be this. The military authorities, as soon as they were ready for a hundred thousand more men, would tell tho Commissioners that they wore able to train and equip thorn, and the men would at once be called up and sent to the depots designated
by the War Office. They would be sent, of course, medically examined and attested, the military authorities having prescribed the standard which the doctors were to adopt. After they had arrived at the depots there could be a further examination, exactly as now, in order to got rid of men who after trial did not appear likely to make good soldiers."
Finally, our article dealt, very much on Lord Derby's lines, with the problem of the soldier in waiting :— " But it will be asked, how would the Commissioners for raising men be able to deal with the overwhelming rush which would, it is admitted, be caused by this ,system of scientific recruiting ? They would deal with it on the perfectly sensible business lines proposed two months ago by the Prime Minister. W hen a man had offered himself as a recruit, and when he had passed the doctor and been attested, he would be told that he was a soldier of his King and country, but that he might not be wanted for several weeks, or even a couple of months. He would therefore be told to return to his home and his work as if he were on furlough,. Since, however, he was a soldier, though not yet a trained one, he would receive a soldier's pay at Army rates—i.e., ls. 3d. a day—till called up for service. All he would have to do would be to present himself at a designated place every Saturday afternoon in order to receive his pay and to report himself as remaining fit and in good health. In addition, he would be given a conspicuous badge, which would indicate to all the world that he had done his duty, and was ready to answer his country's call the moment the country was ready to give him his military training. Meanwhile there is no reason why the men who gave out the pay, who would naturally be old soldiers, should not give the recruit advice as to training himself bodily by the use of physical exercises in order that he might quickly become fit for the athletic work which is now the lot of a soldier. If he could also join a Miniature Rifle Club and train his eye as well as his body, all the better."
We may add that in an article supplementing the article on " Scientific Recruiting," entitled " The Moral Side of Scientific Recruiting," which appeared' also on Novem- ber 7th, 1914, we made the following suggestion :- "The Bing should send a message to his people, endorsed by the Prime Minister and the Cabinet, making it clear once and for all to the country how deadly is the peril of a prolonged war, and how a prolonged war can only be avoided by the provision of men in vast numbers. But this must not be all. There is another point about which Ministers not unnaturally shrink from speaking publicly, but about which they must speak. They must tell the country that, unbounded as is our confidence in the Navy, and splendid as are the achievements of our soldiers, we dare not take any risks in regard to invasion, and that preparations have been made, and still more must be made, to meet the enemy actually on our soil, lest his transports should be able to do what his cruisers did on Tuesday—i.e., evade our overwhelming naval force and come right up to our coastline. Lot the Government toll the nation what preparations must be made in the way of entrenched positions along our chalk downs and on our coasts, and of the stern measures which must be taken should the enemy land to prevent his taking advantage of the resources of the country in food and transport. There are millions of men who have never yet con- templated even for an instant the serious possibilities of invasion —who have not thought what it would mean, and what we should have to do to avoid the fate of Belgium. If the Government told the country fairly and squarely -what the dangers are and how they must be mot, the country would instantly be awakened, and awakened in the right way. There might be a sense of panic for a day or two, or, if yo'u like, of national anguish, but out of that panic and the temporary humiliation would come good. There would be no need of any argument for the time being about the voluntary and compulsory principles. We should got the men as fast as we could register them, and later the country would be steadied by the knowledge that it had been told the truth and taken into the confidence of the Government."
After recommending that our " Commission of Array " . should have on Labour Members and representatives of the Trade Unions, and that the Press advertisements should be taken over by it, we suggested that " a good scientific Press campaign might very well fill the gap while the Commission was arraying the nation—that is, getting the lists of the men of military age preparatory to the individual appeal of which we have spoken." We ended as follows :- " If the military authorities would agree, we think the age of enlistment should be lowered from nineteen to seventeen at one end and raised at the other from thirty-eight to forty-five— always subject, of course, to the proviso that in the case of the young and of the old the medical examination should be specially severe. For service abroad the military authorities would no doubt prefer to keep to the ages of nineteen to thirty-eight. Mon attested under nineteen or over thirty-eight might be detailed for filling up the gaps in the Territorial units. As the drafts go out to the Territorials in India and at the front—and they will very soon be wanted in both oases—the vacancies at home might be made good from this special heap of raw material. There is plenty of work for all, but there is no time to be lost. The enemy is at our gate. We can only get rid of him in one way—Men, Men, Men."
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