Excerpt from Report of the Committee Appointed by the Secretary of State for India to Enquire Into the Administration and Organisation of the Army in India In forwarding you the first part of our Report we desire to point out a difficulty with which we are confronted at the outset of our enquiry. We cannot consider the administration of the Army in India otherwise than as part of the total armed forces of the Empire yet we have no indication of the form of organization which may be set up in the future for the control of other parts of those forces, or of the whole. We have, it is true, been told that proposals for the higher direction of our Imperial forces are under consideration, and we are aware of the circumstances under which an Imperial Cabinet was formed during the late war. But the bases of permanent Imperial control over the organised forces of the Empire are as yet unlaid, and we have therefore been obliged to take existing statutes and usage as the foundation of the proposals we have made in accordance with the terms of our reference. The remedies which we shall venture to suggest for such defects in the Army in India as may be disclosed in the course of our enquiry will therefore be made subject to the limitations we have indicated. Novel political machinery created by the Peace Treat-y has enhanced the importance of the Army of India relatively to the military forces in other parts of the Empire, and more particularly to those of the British Isles. We feel bound to assume that Western Europe will no longer be an armed camp containing national armies in a high state of preparation for war, and we note that conflicts fraught with the gravest consequences to the belligerent nations cannot in future take place within a few days or weeks of an order to mobilise. We realise, and the evidence of Lord Allenby confirms our belief, that the war has left Eastern Europe and what is commonly known as the Near and Middle East in a condition of grave unrest, with consequences to India, especially as regards her military and financial resources, that we are unable to ignore. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.