When I was War Minister I had directed General Narbut, a member of the Military Council, to work out a scheme whereby a reserve of officers might be obtained in war. The essence of this scheme was that our cadet schools should, on mobilization, pass out a larger number of cadets as officers, and should then set to work to train as soon as possible those officers of the 1st and 2nd Categories who volunteered, and also the men of the regulars who were possessed of an intermediate standard of education, thousands of whom were good enough to be given the rank and duties of lieutenant. Why this scheme was not carried out during the war I do not know, but unless steps are taken to do something of this kind in future we shall be in difficulties. We did not take advantage of the possibility when war was declared, or even immediately afterwards, of passing out a greater number of the senior classes of the military and cadet schools. In 1902 these colleges supplied the army with 2,642 officers; we might, therefore, have received at the beginning of 1904 and 1905 more than 5,000 young officers wherewith to fill vacancies in the field. This is precisely what the Japanese did. Foreseeing how we should be placed, on March 19, 1904, I asked the War Minister that officers might be commissioned from the military and _yunker_ schools, before the manœuvres, at the rate of 2 per battalion, 1 per battery, 4 per Cossack regiment, and 100 to the reserve. This was not done. On my repeated representations as to the urgent necessity for increasing the supply, I received in 1904 a curt reply to the effect that the maintenance of the number of officers up to establishment was the duty of the War Minister, not that of the officer commanding the army in the field. When the output was eventually increased, we received only a comparatively small number of those who had just got their commissions. These formed a most desirable element in the army, and in the majority of cases behaved splendidly in action. On the whole, our troops were, for the reasons explained, very short of officers in the greater number of actions. Although the War Department accomplished a great work in sending out the large number of officers that did go to the front, very little discrimination was shown in their selection. It must be acknowledged, also, that we made little use either of our non-commissioned officers in the way of preparing them to take the places of officers, or of the splendid material to our hand in the cadets of the military and cadet schools.