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The centrepiece of Arthur's military efforts would be the [[Black Line]] fiasco, which was intended to drive the Aborigines from the colony's grazing land onto isolated peninsulas where they could be controlled. At the beginning of the Black War in 1826 Arthur issued an official statement setting out those situations that would justify settlers using violence: 'If it should be apparent that there is a determination on the part of one or more of the native tribes to attack, rob, or murder the white inhabitants generally, any person may arm, and joining themselves to the military, drive them by force to a safe distance, treating them as open enemies.<ref>{{Cite book|title = The Forgotten War|last = Reynolds|first = Henry|publisher = UNSW Australia|year = 2013|isbn = 978-1-74223-392-5|page = 63}}</ref>
In 1833, Arthur wrote to his line superior, [[Secretary of State for War and the Colonies]] [[F. J. Robinson, 1st Viscount Goderich|Viscount Goderich]], "I am willing to make almost any prudent sacrifice that may tend to compensate for the injuries that the government is unwillingly and unavoidably made the instrument of inflicting." However, Arthur was a fastidious administrator who once wrote to his son "As to chance and good luck I know of nothing more absurd". "All happens under the direction of providence of the Almighty who works by human agency". To the first Aboriginal Establishment (internment camp) on Bruny Island, Arthur initially sent used blankets without any instruction to laund them and a syphilitic assistant overseer. When mortality there skyrocketed, Arthur became concerned. However, his concern appears to have been for the perception of his Abolitionist patrons and the home government regarding deaths of women and children in custody rather than for the tragedy of the [[Aboriginal Tasmanians|Aboriginal Tasmanians']] lives lost. Arthur obfuscated the mortality and distanced himself by setting up a committee. At the Aboriginal Establishment's subsequent locations, the litany of pernicious mortality-driving failings continued while Arthur, the Committee and the overseers ignore the everyday prophylactic protocols implemented on [[Penal transportation|convict transports]], in prisons and barracks. The failings are in every aspect remarkably reminiscent of the contagion-driving factors documented in an 1811 Parliamentary Paper on the 1909 [[Walcheren Campaign|Walcheren Debacle]] that Arthur most probably read. A split command hobbled the expeditionary force which became figuratively and literally bogged down. Lacking necessary supplies, accommodation and medical care, mortality due to contagion rose to 10%. Arthur served and fell ill at Walcheren. After the evacuation, he become
A ''Sydney Monitor'' editorial on his recall stated, "[Arthur] gave plausible replies, while he smiled in secret, knowing that those smiles would be communicated to his satraps and underlings, and that they would increase rather than mitigate this undercurrent of tyranny against the opposers of his government." The improbable level of failures and this description of his character point to Arthur obfuscating an orchestrated diminution which is consistent with a caution Arthur had received from Goderich's predecessor, [[George Murray (British Army officer)|Sir George Murray]], in 1830. Murray – an expert in military intelligence analysis who had served as a lieutenant-governor – wrote, "the adoption of any line of conduct, having for its avowed, or for its secret object, the extinction of the Native race, could not fail to leave an indelible stain upon the character of the British Government."<ref>{{cite book |volume=1: Introduction |first=Nicholas |last=Russell |date=1 June 2022 |title=Manuscripts relating to the January 1830 samurai repulse of the piratically seized Van Diemen's Land colonial brig ''Cyprus'' from Mugi, Awa Province (Tokushima), Japan |url=https://piratesandsamurai.com/1.Introduction.pdf |pages=91–92, 111–118, 136–146 |access-date=3 March 2022 |publisher=Nicholas Russell |location=Ashiya, Japan |via=Pirates and Samurai}}{{self-published inline|date=June 2023}}</ref>
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