In 1903 we were only able to reckon on four through military trains on the Siberian line, and on three short trains on the Eastern Chinese. Towards the end of that year relations with Japan became strained; it seemed as if, having made all her preparations, she was seeking a pretext for war, and was therefore meeting all the concessions we made by fresh and quite impossible demands. Our unreadiness was only too plain, but it seemed at that time that we should be able, with two or three years’ steady work, so to strengthen our position in the Far East and improve the railway, the fleet, the land forces, and the fortresses of Port Arthur and Vladivostok, that Japan would have small chance of success against us. It was proposed, in the event of trouble, to send out, to begin with [in addition to the troops already in the Far East], reinforcements consisting of four army corps (two regular and two reserve) from European Russia. Owing to the unreadiness of the railways, and the uncertainty as to the time it would take to improve them, it was impossible to draw up concentration time-tables with any accuracy. According to these tables, 500 troop trains and a large number of goods trains would be necessary to transport from European Russia the drafts for the Far East, the 3rd Battalions of the East Siberian Rifle Regiments, several batteries, local units and ammunition parks for the East Siberian Rifle Divisions, the 4th Siberian Corps, and the two army corps from Russia (10th and 17th). Moreover, upon mobilization, the Siberian Military District would require local transport for a very considerable distance. This would add about three weeks to the time required for through transport of the above reinforcements.
As I have said, we expected that from January, 1904, the Siberian and Eastern Chinese lines would be able to give us daily five trains each way; but the concentration of one-half of the reinforcements to go to the Far East actually took five months from the declaration of war. One of the most important of the War Minister’s tasks, therefore, was to get the Siberian and Eastern Chinese lines into a more efficient state as rapidly as possible. My scheme was to improve them at first up to a capacity of seven trains each way in the twenty-four hours, and on the southern branch of the Eastern Chinese (along which movements would have to take place through Harbin from both sides, from Pri-Amur and Trans-Baikal) to fourteen pairs of trains. My proposal was approved by the Tsar, who noted against the figure fourteen the words, “Or even up to twelve pairs of military trains.” In the middle of January, 1904, he appointed a special committee to consider the questions of the money and time required for the immediate improvement of the railways as suggested. This committee, consisting of the Ministers of War, Ways and Communications, Finance, and the State Comptroller, was under the presidency of General Petroff, of the Engineers. It was instructed to ascertain what should be done to enable seven pairs of military trains to be run on the Siberian and Eastern Chinese lines, and twelve pairs on the southern branch (from Harbin to Port Arthur).