652 
ORGAN, &C. 
the excellent arrangements for "bringing np the troops [to the point of 
crossing are worthy of the closest study. Besides the evident lessons 
to be drawn from the above. Captain Medycki counsels the careful study 
of all new engines of war, so that an army may not be surprised by the 
enemy using a new weapon, as the Turks were by the Bussian torpedoes. 
The author then observes that it seems to him that this campaign was 
planned by an eminent strategist who himself was not on the spot, and 
that, when one operation went wrong, the whole collapsed, and there 
was no one in the army able to set the unwieldy machine moving again.* 
The Bussian cavalry did nothing. Osman Pasha appears in front of 
a column of Bussian infantry, the Shipka garrison vanishes in a summer 
night, and many other instances might be brought forward to prove 
how utterly ignorant of the u service d } exploration” the Bussian 
horsemen were. The lesson to be drawn from this is obvious. 
The Bussian army is drilled to perfection, but this very perfection was 
a snare to it, for, when its antiquated formation for attack was found to 
be inapplicable to modern conditions of fighting, it was found that the 
men could not be got to advance in any other, in short, the want of 
intelligence among the rank and file prevented their adopting a new 
system of tactics, as the Germans did in 1870, in the middle of a 
campaign. It was this blind adhesion to the tactics of a past age 
which ruined the Bussians in 1806. In the battles before Plevna, the 
author finds that in six points the Bussians failed. (1.) They did not 
reconnoitre the enemy's position sufficiently. Troops should be trained 
to reconnoitre in peace, and there is no more favorable time for doing 
this than during the route-marching season. A few men sent out will 
serve to represent an enemy, and those wearisome exercises will thus 
be made interesting. (2.) They attacked with forces numerically 
insufficient and separated from one another; the attack was conducted 
on no fixed plan, and was only frontal, and the proper feeding of the 
fighting line was misunderstood. In the first battle of Plevna the 5th 
Division (9000 strong) was spread over a front of 28 kilometres (41- 
paces per man), and the two main columns were 8 kilometres apart. 
(3.) The three arms of the service did not work together. (4.) The 
proper point of attack was not selected. (5.) The Bussian formations 
were not suitable to the conditions of modern warfare. (6.) Proper 
use was not made of the arms they possessed, although those were far 
inferior to the Turkish weapons. Against this may be urged the 
splendid bravery of the troops, and their predilection for the bayonet. 
“ The bayonet is a good fellow, the bullet is a fool," said old Souvaroff, 
and his lessons are remembered in the Bussian army to this day. The 
Turks are accused of not taking advantage of their victories, but against 
that may be placed their clever system of field fortification, and the 
excellent use they made of their rifles and guns. Into all the obser¬ 
vations of Captain Medycki we have not here space to enter, but can 
heartily recommend his paper as one of the most interesting criticisms 
of the 1877-8 war we have read. 
Translator’s Note .—We Rave heard this opinion as to the foreign origin of the plan of campaign 
strongly supported in certain foreign military circles, 
