The citizen-Republican. (Scotland, Bon Homme County, S.D.) 1???-19??, 1904-03-17
SAYS JAPS ARE the
EQUAL OF NAPOLEON
a Military Expert in london
Writes of Their Opera
tons on Land.
is LIKE ITALIAN CAMPAIGN
World Is Now in the Presence of thu
Greatest Leadership Since the
Day Of the Famous Bona
parte.

London, March 14.-The more n
considers the silence. secrecy and sud
denness of the Japanese stroke in these
days of telegraphs and Of correspond
ents eagerly watching for news. the
calm. steady preparation and then the
almost incredibly rapid development,
the more 1t seems as IL we were in the
presence Of an event with which there
has been nothing to compare since Ma
poleon staggered Europe by appearing
on the plains OF Italy. descending from
the Alps as from the clouds. and shat
tering the whole framework Of Aus
trian power in Italy,"
Thus writes the military critic Of the
Telegraph. an officer of high rank and
standing in the British army 1t is his
conclusion of a discussion OF the re-
markable series Of movements by which
the Japanese have been elbowing the
Russians out Of Korea and southern
Manchuria.
Vi~tory of the Tactician.
He poiL>s out hat 1t has been the
victory OF the tactician, not Of the field
marshal; of the general who maneuvers
his enemy out of positions by making
them, n after another, Illogical and
u~ntenabIe. There has been nothing
spectacular for the enjoyment of the
outsider; no battles have been fought,
no splendid charges have been neces-
sary, none Of the pomp n panoply
and bloodshed which people associate
with the heroism of the battlefield have
been exhibited. Yet the Japanese have
conducted and steadily won one of the
most remarkable campaigns in a cen
tury.
I'm opening the land campaign" con-
tinues this authority, 1.-The japanese
bettered the expectations of their great
est friends. The boosted Russian de-
lenses on the Yalu have collapsed COM
pletely without serious fighting before
the Japanese advances. Whether the
Russian defensive positions al Antung
and WIFI were or were not purely
mythical, we do not know as yet.
Uncertainties of the Situation.
1t may be that they We're turned
higher up the river by a force crossing
the river on the ice, and that when the
Russians ound there was already IN
army threatening their rear, they ban
doned them. In any case, Feng-huang-
cheng, which the japanese have cap
tured. is on the direct Peking road,
which passes through Antung, and
which is fifty miles in the rear of it.
The whole situation is puzzllng. We
do not know in what strength the Jap
anese have advanced, nor whether part
OF their force came by that road and
part of 1t from the side Of Broughton
bay and Port La2areff.
THE position said to be taken up
by $4,000 men attributed to the Rus
sian army at Hai-Cheng and Lao Yang
must be designed to defend the con-
n%ection of the railway between Mukden
and Port Arthur and Niu-chuang. In
the race of an immensely superior
army, such as the Japanese will be able
TO oppose to 1t, this looks like q hope
less m1sconception Of the situation.
The two places are fifty miles apart. A
force Of $4,000 men could not hold both
| n hon. ar 49, -
between them.
fdew chwsns Is Lost.
In any case, it is clear that the
russian force In these two places will
not be able to prevent the japanese
from Selling the port Of New Chwang
from the land side, and so throwing IT
open to their fleet, while, with the
japanese in force seventy miles east
of New Chwang, as 1t is said to be, the
Whole Of the Lao Tung peninsula lies
open to them, n the railway to Port
Arthur shortly will be in their hands.
The broad effect of the campaign
SO far is n:anifestly that the whole OF
the seaboard from New Chwang right
around the whole coast of the Lilac
Tung peninsula, with the exception OF
Port Arthur, the Lao Tung gulf
Korea bay and Korea, to and beyond
B~roughton bay, is in the hands of the
Japanese as completely as the sea was
at the first stroke Of the navy.
1T Is a strange, marvellous collapse
Of the Russian power on land, and
offers facilities for future operations
on land such as the greatest admirers
of Japan could not have imagined
would be by this time in their hands
That the $4,000 men at Lao Tung and
Hal Cheng will be able either to pre-
vent the Japanese from selling the
railway to Mukden or capturing Muk-
a1 - 4f1 tr,or wv TN1-,- -s1 E L.
fortunate If they escape from being
cut off and forced to capitulate. Tha,
the Japanese will be content to res
on their success l do not believe for 8
noment."
GAM TIE DEAcnM