ANTI-JAPANESE.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 65, 18 March 1938, Page 8

ANTI-JAPANESE.

SENTIMENT IN U.S.A. WIDESPREAD BOYCOTT. NEUTRALITY LAWS UNFAIR. "In spite of Japanese propaganda suggesting that the United States is friendly as compared with Great Britain, there is really strong anti-Japanese sentiment all through the States, which has expressed itself in a widespread boycott movement against Japanese goods," said Mr. W. L. Holland, secretary of the Institute of Pacific Relations, New York, who arrived by the Monterey to-day. While in New Zealand he will visit his home town, Thnaru, and lecture to the various groups of the Institute of Pacific Relations in the Dominion.

"The effect of this boycott in the States has been that many chain and department stores have been forced to reduce their imports from Japan. There is no likelihood, however, that the boycott will develop on a national scale. In any case, any such move could become effective only if there was a definite refusal to sell cotton and oil to Japan." There had been great criticism of the oil companies in America for selling huge quantities of aviation petrol to Japan to such an extent that the ordinary American supply of oil tankers had been disrupted. "People are saying that they are in favour of neutrality but they say that this move of the oil companies is a travesty of the word," said Mr. Holland. "The U.S.A. by this action i* actually assisting Japan to defeat China. Aiding Aggressor Nation. "I can testify as to the result of this policy," Mr. Holland continued. "Since j the outbreak of the war I have been in China and have seen thousands of Japanese army trucks and other motor vehicles powered by American gasoline. That is why the American, people object. They insist on a change in the American neutrality law, which was designed almost entirely for European purposes—to help Great Britain. As it works out, it actually assists Japan an aggressor nation, and is totally unfair to China, which has much wider sympathy in the U.S.A. at large."

Since the beginning of the Sino-Japan-ese war the losses of the U.S.A. Government had been considerable in China —more especially i„ Shanghai, where a large trade had been developed in recent years.

The possibility of a Pacific pact was touched upon by Mr. Holland, who said that the idea had been discussed at several conferences and had received a fair amount of support. At the present time, however, it was definitely regarded as an academic matter. "But there is also every probability of considerable drastic changes in treaty relations coming out of the East after the war and the institute to which I belong will devote a large part of a recent grant to an extensive inquiry into the fundamentals of this problem," said Mr. Holland.

The Institute of Pacific Relations, of wlnoli Mr. Holland is research secretary, devotes itself to a study of international affairs in the Pacific and is well known through its conferences, hekl every three years, the last one being- lield in 193(5. The work is all unofficial, and there are no recommendations to Government and, for that reason, the institute can discrss' all problems frankly. It has many influential leaders among whom is* Mr. Voshizawa. former Foreign Minister of Jp pan. The U.S.A. leader was, until Ins death recently. Mr. Newton D. Baker, former Secretary o f War for the U S 4." under President Wilson.

Mr. Holland, who attended Canterbury College, went first of all to Honolulu as a member of the international secretariat of the institute, and since then he has been stationed in New York, spending a good deal of time in China and Japan.