man recognised as the most competent, you may also
strengthen the political direction by a similar procedure. The Cabinet
has thus, perhaps without suspicion of what it was doing, set before the
Nation the true problem: "Wanted, a Ministry competent in the management
of war."

THE NATION'S BUSINESS

_December 28th_, 1899

War is the Nation's business and, when it comes, the most important part
of the Nation's business. A Nation that for many years neglects this
branch of its affairs is liable to suffer to any extent. The proverb, "a
stitch in time saves nine," gives a very fair idea of the proportion
between the amount of effort required in a properly-prepared and
well-conducted war, and the amount required when there has been previous
neglect.

There must be some way in which a national affair of such importance can
be properly managed, and just now it might be well to consider how a
nation can manage a war. Certainly not by the methods of political
decision to which recent developments of democracy have accustomed us.
You cannot fight a campaign by consulting the constituencies or even the
House of Commons before deciding whether a general shall move to his
right or his left, shall advance or retire, shall seek or shall avoid a
battle. Neither can you settle by popular vote whether you will make
guns of wire or of fluid compressed steel, what formations your infantry
shall adopt, whether the soldier is to give six hours a week to shooting
and one to drill, or six to drill and one to shooting.

Yet all these questions and many others must be settled, some during
peace and some during war, and they must be settled correctly or else
there will be defeat. In political matters the accepted test of what is
correct is the opinion of the majority as expressed by votes in a
general election, but in war the test of what is correct is the result
produced upon the enemy. If his guns out-range yours, if his troops at
the point of collision defeat yours, there has been some error in the
preparation or in the direction, unless indeed the enemy is a State so
much stronger than your own that it was folly to go to war at all, and
in that case there must have been an error of policy. The decisions upon
which successful war depends turn upon matters which have no relation
to the wishes or feelings of the majority; matters not of opinion but of
fact; matters about which eloquence is no guide, and in regard to which
the trut