CAB9-1_PT1 — Page 259

Printed for the use of the Colonial Office. November 15, 1894.

Page 259

CONFIDENTIAL.

94-R

CEYLON.

CEYLON.

No. 10.

Defence Scheme as revised to January 1894.

Remarks by the Colonial Defence Committee.

THIS is the first occasion on which a Defence Scheme that can at all appropriately be designated as such has been received from Ceylon, and the Colonial Defence Committee desire to preface their remarks on the Scheme with an expression of their appreciation of the ability and care which the Local Defence Committee have shown in its preparation, and of the manner in which on the present occasion they have steered clear of controversial subjects, the intrusion of which has hitherto delayed the production of a satisfactory Scheme, and have confined themselves to the legitimate task before them, viz., the consideration of the measures to be taken if an attack on the Colony were at the moment imminent.

The principal points which call for modification or further consideration at the next annual revision are as follows:-

1. Covering Letters. Since the Scheme was printed the Colonial Defence Committee have had before them a further letter of the General Officer Commanding to the Governor, dated the 22nd June, 1894, in continuation of the correspondence contained in the covering letters on the subject of the relations of the General Officer Commanding to the Governor in war-time. In that letter, the General Officer Commanding claims that to carry out the instructions of para. 22 of the Colonial Defence Committee's Memorandum No. 46 of the 3rd May, 1893, he must of necessity during a state of war be invested with the chief responsibility of carrying on the Civil Government, and must virtually supersede the Governor.

The Committee can see nothing in that Memorandum which even implies that the General Officer Commanding is to acquire and exercise the special powers to which Major-General Justice refers in his letter. The only reference made therein to the acquisition of any special powers by the General Officer Commanding is to "such as are required for securing sites for works, occupation of buildings, requisitioning of supplies, and transport, all these being minor measures which directly concern the military action of the General Officer Commanding in war-time, and for the due execution of which it is manifest that he must be invested by the supreme Civil authority with certain powers. This will be arranged for by an Order in Council which is now under consideration, and beyond that nothing was intended or can indeed be fairly inferred from the text.

The duty of the General Officer Commanding is to place before the Governor, in detail, any extraordinary action of the Government which is, in his opinion, necessary in the case of, and in anticipation of, attack. It is for the Governor to decide on the powers necessary, and the steps to be taken, to carry out such action. When the matter has been fully discussed and the various measures decided on, the Local Defence Committee should record the results in the Scheme of Defence.

[687]

Page 259

Page 259

20