The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1900-09-08
THE METHODS OF MODERN WARFARE.
How the Profession Killing Your FeOwMan has Been Smpfd With
Past Few Years.

The present campaign in China Nus
trates with great vividness the vast
change that has taken place in meth
DDS of warfare during the past century.
Except for a few rifles, and smaH
number of Anticipated field guns, the
Chinese fought with their ancient
weapons, spears: some had bows anu
arrows; others were armed with clups'
Not one in a hundred had nrearhl
that would have been used during the
war of the American Revolution, 1ffo
Germany had armed one section OF
China with Mausers, long ago, when
trouble was anticipated with the Rus
SLAMS And Russia, it is said, had
armed a portion of China against Ger
many. Even France had contributed
arms to China and so had England;
therefore the soldiers of the Celestial
Kiagdom boosted much more ambitious
weapons and more numerous ones than
they would otherwise have had 1t IS
well known that the Chinese govern
ment has made no attempt to arm its
soldiers with up-to-date weapons.
In the matter of reconnaissance the
Chinese know nothing. Indians have
their scouts; and even the most I'M
skilled of armies have their pickets,
but the Chinese have always disdained
the idea of scout or picket They do
nothing to ascertain the state or
strength of the opposing hosts, nor do
they even care to know when they are
advancing; sufficient to know when
they arrive!
In modern war the Importance of ac-
curate and reliable reconnaissance mas
Increased a hundredfold, owing to the
fact that the forces engaged in the de-
cisive battle have become far greater
in number, and the distances to be COW
cred both in concentrating the troops
for battle and in disposing them on the
battlefield itself, greatly exceed those
of the past. Specially trained scouts
and orderIies are used by all armies
To free the cavalry of the smaller ele-
rnents of its reconnaissance work, and
economize its fighting power as much
as possible, most of the great nations
are now training kind of mounted in
fantry in this work.
In Germany each army corps has
squadron of mounted orderlies'' of this
kind, and they have proved invaluable;
in Russia a number of the best men in
each company are mounted and trained
in patrol and reconnaissance duty, in
structed in riding horses and bicycles,
and exercised by affording them oppor-
tunities to engage in bear and tiger
hunts; in England each brigade of the
cavalry division sent to South Africa
received a battalion of mounted infan-
try with a Maxim gun; in Austria
mounted scouts assist the cavalry in
their reconnoitring.
The United States Signal Corps in
the Philippines has surpassed all pre-
vious records in this field
Wireless biography is still in the ex-
perimental stage, although it is now
being tested practically in the field in
the Transvaal. Improvements are be-
ing constantly made, and it's future
,. ON Of he
latest applications Is to balloons, but
the difficulty of carrying the apparatus
properly in the basket has led to
modification consisting in leaving the
latter on table on the ground below.
the balloon merely carrying up a cop
per wire, which hung down several
yards below the basket to send the
waves received by the apparatus
on through space.
The signal service is of great benefit.
The heliograph has been specially de-
veloped in sunny climates; by the Brit
ish in Afghanistan and in Africa by
the French in Tonl<in, by the Ameri-
cans in the United States, and by the
Greeks in Crete It has been used sue
cessfully over single stretches of over
IS miles. In France the acetylene lamp
has greatly increased the use of the
apparatus by making it independent of
sunlight, and signals have been read
as far as 81 miles by day and IS miles
by night
In Italy the acetylene lamp flash has
been read at a distance of seventy-two
miles, The navy searchlights landed in
Cape Colony have been used for flash
signalling and have greatly extended
the range At coast forts and in the
navy the Ardois signal light Ga COM
bination of red and white electric lamps
hung in the rigging or on a mast) are
extensively used for short distances,
either between ships. or between forts
and ships
There has been a recent and most
novel use made of searchlights The
use of searchlights by ships and by
coast and other forts is well known,
but recently they have also been ap-