CAB9-1_PT1 — Page 286

Page 286

Printed for the use of the Colonial Office. February 26, 1895.

SECRET.

103-R

MALTA.

MALTA 5.

No. 3041.

Defence Scheme revised to January 1895.

•

Remarks by the Colonial Defence Committee.

THIS Scheme is in many respects an advance on its predecessor, being simpler, more clear, and concise, but it contains a serious initial fault in the distribution of command adopted under which the command of the entire sea front is made distinct from and independent of the command of the rest of the Fortress. The coast forts and batteries from St. Lucians on the right to Madalena on the left are divided into three sea sections, each under a Lieu- tenant-Colonel, R.A., and constitute as a whole a separate artillery command under the orders of the General Officer Commanding the Royal Artillery Brigade; while all the troops and works outside the sea forts and batteries are divided into three land or field force sections, each under a Lieutenant-Colonel of the Royal Engineers or Infantry, and constitute as a whole a separate com- mand under the orders of the General Officer Commanding the Infantry Brigade. The reason given for this organization of command is the alleged strong line of demarcation between the functions of the forts and batteries along the sea front and those of the mobile forces and landward defences.

Even admitting that this reason might hold good in the case of the forts on the centre of the sea front directly defending the entrance to the harbours of Valetta, it cannot be considered applicable to the forts and batteries on the flanks of the sea front, and on which the flanks of the land defence rest. In the case of an attempted landing from Marsa Scala to Marsa Scirocco the functions of the Commanders of the eastern sea and eastern land sections would overlap in the same area, and the same would occur, though perhaps to a less degree, with the western sea and western land sections.

In the 1893 Defence Scheme the fortress was divided into three sections, each section comprising a sea and a land subsection, but as, under certain circumstances, the General Officer Commanding the Royal Artillery Brigade was to assume the control of the three sea subsections, and the General Officer Commanding the Infantry Brigade was to assume the control of the three land subsections, the difference between it and the present Scheme was more nominal than real. The Colonial Defence Committee in paragraph 7 of their Remarks of the 19th December, 1893, on the Scheme of that year, drew attention to this tendency to draw a sharp division between the artillery and the infantry of the Defence and to create within one area two authorities practically independent of one another. Such à separation of the Arms is distinctly at variance with the principles enunciated in Adjutant-General's Circular of the

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