ut mention. From the very nature of the case the main
Allied effort was the formation and organisation of a new Russian army.
Our policy was not to prop Russia on her feet, but to enable her to
stand by herself. Major-General Knox had been sent out by the War
Office to accomplish this purpose, and no more able or competent officer
could have been appointed for the task.

General Knox had hardly begun to perform this duty when the French
agents in Siberia became alarmed for their own position. Cables were
dispatched to Europe pointing out the danger to French prestige which
General Knox's mission entailed. If the English were to be made
responsible for the reorganisation of the Russian Army, and were
successful, this would tend to make New Russia rely more upon the
English than the French, as had been the case hitherto; that it would be
better to leave Russia without an army than have it organised under such
influence. These senseless fears of our French friends found willing
listeners in Paris. General Knox had already made some selections of
officers and the business was well under way when a message from the
Allied Council in Paris put an extinguisher on all his work. His orders
were cancelled, and he was told to do nothing until a French commander
had been appointed, whose name would be forwarded later.

By this uninformed Allied interference a well-thought-out scheme of army
reorganisation was hung up for four of the most precious months to
Russia. By the time General Ganin arrived the time for the project had
passed and the whole business had been taken out of Allied hands.

The Russian situation at that time was such that four days' delay would
have been fatal, and if nothing had been done for four months we should
have been hunted out of the country.

Finding Allied jealousy so great as to render all their efforts
impotent, first General Bolderoff and then his successor, the Supreme
Governor, began to organise armies on their own for the protection of
the people and their property. These armies were ill-equipped and badly
disciplined--not the kind of armies which would have been raised had
General Knox's plans been allowed to develop--but they performed their
duty, they captured Perm, and had increased to over 200,000 before
General Ganin appeared on the scene.

When General Ganin reported himself to the Supreme Governor with the
Allied Council's orders to take over the command of the Allied and
Russian forc