Friedrich Engels 
The war 


New-York Daily Tribune. 
Nr. 4483, 1. September 1855 


The war. 


It appears that the assault on the Malakoff, which was expected to have 
taken place on the 15th, had to be postponed, and that the preliminary 
bombardment did not commence till the 17th. Indeed, there is reason to 
suspect that the siege works are not in so forward a state as the journals 5 
of Paris and London have reported. Though the Allies had worked hard 
at them through the month of July, and though we were constantly told 
that they were at last quite close to the Russians, we have the best au- 
thority for the statement that on the 4th of August the head of the sap 
was still 115 metres, or 460 yards, from the Russian main ditch! It is 10 
certainly satisfactory to see Hotspur Pélissier brought down to the ac- 
knowledgement that this system of assault has failed, and that regular 
siege works must pave the way for his columns; but for all that, to leave 
200,000 men quiet in their tents to wait for the completion of these trench- 
es, and to die, in the mean time, of cholera and fever, is singular 15 
management. It must be confessed that from first to last, this has been a 
war of incapacities on both sides. Todtleben is the only man in either 
camp who has shown a spark of genius. 

With regard to the attack on Sweaborg, we are also still without full 
official reports or newspaper correspondence. The facts, however, appear 20 
on a careful examination of all the information at hand to be as follows: 

The Allied fleets, six liners, four or five large frigates, and about thirty 
mortar-vessels and gunboats, crossed over from the Revel to Sweaborg 
August 7. On the 8th they took up their positions. The vessels of light 
draft passed through the shoals and rocks west of the fortress, where no 25 
large ship can pass, and drew up at long range from the islands on which 
Sweaborg is situated. The large vessels remained outside, and as far as we 
can judge out of range of the forts. Then the gunboats and mortar-vessels 


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The war 


opened fire. No direct firing appears to have been attempted. It was all 
shelling from mortars or shell-guns at the highest elevation practicable. 
The bombardment lasted forty-five hours. As to the amount of damage 
inflicted it is not possible to estimate without detailed accounts from 
5 both parties. The arsenal and various magazines of powder (apparently 
small ones) were destroyed. The town of Sweaborg, (so far as we know 
only a few houses inhabited by people connected with the fleet or the 
works,) was burnt. As to the fortifications themselves, the damage done 
to them cannot but be insignificant, for the fleets, as both Admirals state, 
10 had not a man killed, only a few wounded, and no loss whatever in 
matérie. No better proof could be given that they kept out of harm's 
way. In that case they might bombard, but could not act by direct fire, by 
which alone fortifications can be destroyed. Dundas, who is far more 
honest and collected in his report than the French Admiral, (at least as 
15 his dispatch runs in the official publication,) avers that the damage in- 
flicted was confined to the three islands (out of the seven constituting 
Sweaborg) which are situated west of the main entrance of the bay of 
Helsingfors. That entrance does not even appear to have been attempted. 
The large vessels can scarcely have acted at all, and the decisive act in 
20 such an attack—the landing of troops to possess themselves of the works 
and destroy them—was entirely out of the question. Thus the damage 
inflicted falls upon stores and storehouses exclusively—that is, upon mat- 
ters easily replaced; and if the Russians avail themselves of their time and 
means, Sweaborg may in three weeks be in as good a condition as ever. 
25 Militarily speaking, it has not suffered at all; the material results of the 
whole affair are hardly worth its cost; and it seems to have been under- 
taken merely because the Baltic fleet must do something before it comes 
home for the season. 


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