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Show j Says War Will Last Two Years- ! ''Speaking deliberately and gravely," says A. J. j Hales, the famous war correspondent, to the San j Francisco Call of last Sunday, as he made his way j on board the China, bound for the seat of war in the I Orient, "I consider that it will be at least two years I before we see the end of the Kusso-Japanese struggle. strug-gle. I want to say right now that my sympathy is fully withJapan, and that I am entirely antagonistic antago-nistic the earth-hunger of Iiussia, but I am quite conscious of the enormous Muscovite power. I never thought the Russian fleet would go out, but that it would merely hang around Port Arthur. "I expect the Japanese, who in dash and method are very like the French, to make a brilliant stand, but the heavy, cold Russian is the more canny of the two. The present procedure of Russia is the same as she has always followed, even in the time of the great war god Napoleon, whose army she toyed with and wrecked. Then again, in the Crimea, at first it was thought that Turkey would easily blot Russia Rus-sia off the map, and the secret for this easily nursed optimism was a bitter lesson for Turkey, France and England. "I believe that Russia is "now playing ihe same game with Japan. Presently her forces will be concentrated, con-centrated, she will fall back as far as she dare, draw Japan into extended marches and leave the mikado's men with the frown burden of guarding a grcatly increased line of communication. Certainly Russia is not showing her full hand at present. She is dogged in purpose, great at the finish of a fight and has never been lacking in fine generals. It should be remembered, too, that Japan as a commercial nation suffers something extra in every moment of the war, while with. Russia, who lives within herself and has hardly any commerce, the case is quite different. dif-ferent. Whether the vim and spirit of the Japanese can cope with the steady policy and endurance of the Russians is a question yet to be answered. ' A : |