econd year of 20,000 mounted
troops at L60 a year each . . . 1,200,000
Add to this cost of first-class Reserve
of 96,000 at L10 7s. 6d.
each . . . . . . . 997,600
Cost of 30,000 men for six months'
extra training at the rate of
L60 a year each . . . . . 900,000
Cost of extra training for supplementary
officers and non-commissioned
officers . . . . . . 500,000
-----------
L21,892,815
Add to this the cost of the troops
maintained in the Colonies and
Egypt so far as charged to
British Estimates . . . . L3,401,704
-----------
Total personnel . . . L25,294,519
Materiel (allowing for additional
outlay due to larger numbers) . . 4,500,000
Staff and administration . . . 1,500,000
------------
Total Cost of Army at Home
and in the Colonies . . L31,294,519
This is slightly in excess of the present cost of the personnel of the
Army, but, whereas the present charge only provides for the
heterogeneous force already described of 589,000 men, the charges here
explained provide for a short-service homogeneous army of one million
and a half, as well as for the 45,000 troops permanently maintained in
Egypt and the Colonies.
The estimate just given is, however, extravagant. The British system has
innumerable different rates of pay and extra allowances of all kinds,
and is so full of anomalies that it is bound to be costly.
Unfortunately, the Army Estimates are so put together that it is
difficult to draw from them any exact inferences as to the actual annual
cost of a private soldier beyond his pay.
The average annual cost, effective and non-effective, of an officer in
the cavalry, artillery, engineers, and infantry is L473, this sum
covering all the arrangements for pensions and retiring allowances.
I propose in the following calculations to assume the average cost of an
officer to be L500 a year, a sum which would make it possible for the
average combatant officer to be somewhat better paid than he is at
present.
The normal pay of a sergeant in the infantry of the line is 2s. 4d. a
day, or
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