FRIDAY, AUGUST 19, 1927. BRITAIN JUSTIFIED IN CHINA.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 195, 19 August 1927, Page 6

FRIDAY, AUGUST 19, 1927. BRITAIN JUSTIFIED IN CHINA.

The latest news from China is disquieting in the extreme. The Northern armies have inflicted a series of crushing defeats upon the Nationalist forces, and the Nationalists are falling back southward in dire confusion. Already the Northern guns are bombarding Nanking, and fugitives are streaming in thousands into Shanghai .and tht surrounding territory. The fact that the Nationalist general who has been commanding the Southern garrison at Nanking has reached Shanghai "ahead of his troops" suggests that a wild rush for shelter or safety has already begun. All this means a serious menace to Shanghai, and especially to the foreign settlement. For if the Northern armies pursuing the Cantonese are not checked they are likely to occupy Shanghai, and it may be difficult, if not impossible, for their leaders to restrain the rank and file of their troops when once they are in close proximity to the hated "foreign devils." No doubt the international settlement will be efficiently defended. But the situation is certainly precarious, add its gravity serves once more to emphasise the political wisdom of Government when it insisted, against bitter criticism and furious opposition, in dispatching adequate forces for the protection of British interests in the Far East. Many people assumed that becauso the Cantonese Government was betterorganised than the Peking Government, and at least professed to conduct itself on constitutional lines, therefore it must of necessity prevail over" all its opponents. But the great difficulty to be surmounted in conducting a war is finance, and in China no armies have ever been regularly paid. This accounts for the prevalence of banditti who simply live on the country; and the Southern armies must to a large extent in this respect follow the lead of their Northern rivals. In all probability Chajig Tso-lin is quite as well able as Chiang Kai-shek to organise and conduct guerrilla warfare; and as the Cantonese forces are to'some extent divided and demoralised by the Bolshevik trouble, it is quite likely that the Northern armies may sweep over the Yang-tse and that the Southern Republic may collapse in ruins. In any ease, for the moment the North prevails, and the present situation raises a very interesting question. A few weeks ago the British Labour party was very indignant with Mr. Baldwin and Sir Austen Chamberlain for refusing to recognise the Cantonese Government as .the real sovereign Power in China. If Britain had taken the advice of Labour, and acknowledged Chiang Kai-shek and liis friends as virtual rulers of the country, what would have been ! our position now?