Willmar tribune. [volume] (Willmar, Minn.) 1895-1931, 1904-06-08
THE WONDERFUL JAPANESE.
Their Achievements During First
Three Months of War with Rus
STA Will Live in History.

Less than three months have elapsed
since the clash of arms between Japan
and Russia, and already the most san
guine Japaphiles find that their pre-
dictions of success were far below the
mark of real accom- plishment, says the
Cleveland Leader, of recent date.
Since the opening of the war the
Japanese navy has destroyed, disabled,
crippled, or confined the Russian fleet in
eastern waters. The fleet thus made in
effective was greater, on paper at least,
certainly far more imposing in battle
ships and armored cruisers, than the
entire navy of the United States at the
time of the Spanish-American war. To
do this the Japanese had sea force in
ferior in numbers, though possibly
somewhat more coherent and homo
geneous Through the operations at sea
the mainland of Asia has been opened
the boosted Gibraltar of the orient,
made innocuous. if not untenable
When the war opened Russia was
dominant in the Korean peninsula
Russian ministers. agents and spies at
Seoul had made of the Hermit kingdom
a dependency of the car.
In less than three months the Jap
anese have assumed and enforced a pro-
tectorate over Korea. have freed the en-
tire peninsula of Russian troops Tor
practically SOY, have landed an army of
offense Of $4,000 men, and another of
occupation of $4,000, with a garrison of
between 5000 and 5000 at Seoul, and
have established an immense and we'll
guarded depot for supplies at Chemul-
pc. Under weather conditions that sug-
gested the word ''impossible'' the Jap
anese troops have advanced to and oc-
cupied the east bank of the Yalu river,
and are preparing to cross that boun-
Diary into Manchuria. with little doubt
that Russian opposition to the crossing
will prove ineffective. Every mountain
pass on the road from Seoul to the Yalu
has been fortified. the inhabitants have
been pacified and taught to look upon
the Japanese as their preservers from
ton with the base at Chemulpo has
been established, fortified, and guarded,
so that in case of defeat retreat could
be accomplished with minimum of loss.
The physical and apparent accom-
plishments of these wonderful little
brown fighters are equaled by the NOR
al and speculative results attained
The Japanese have made such effective
use Of torpedoes and submarine mines
that the great powers of the world are
forced to debate in congresses and par
liaments, and in their war and navy
departments, the question whether bat
tleships, as weapons of offense, are, or
are not, obsolete. New possibilities of
strategy have been shown, and those
who contended that under modern con-
ditlons no enemy could be deceived, as
was once possible, are confronted with
the fact that Admiral Togo laid a trap
for Makaroff. baited it, and would prob
ably have utterly destroyed his oppo-
nent's fleet, had it not been for the lift
ing of a morning mist AS it was his
mines did in two minutes what two
months might have been regarded as
we'll spent in accomplishing. 1t is sim
ply marvellous that, so far as the world
is Informed, the only vessel of the Rus
slams sunk by gun fire was the Variag.
In the courtesies demanded of particle
pants in modern warfare the Japanese
have been as conspicuous as in the
sterner aspects. No more graceful
tribute was ever paid by heroic foe to
his heroic enemy than that accorded
Makaroff in Toxic. Russian prisoners.
we'll or wounded, have been treated
with exceptional kindness; and if the
japanese are not civilized, as some as
sert. civilization might learn lessons
from those insular barbarians.
No matter what the final results may
be, the first three months of the Russo
Japanese war will go down in history
as trenching upon the miraculous. and
as teaching lessons to the world in DOS
slbilities of offensive operations at sea