THE CHALLENGE OF JAPAN

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22201, 18 September 1937, Page 7

THE CHALLENGE OF JAPAN

DANGER IN THE "NEAR NORTH" MR F. MILNER ON EASTERN SITUATION New Zealand and Australia could not flatter themselves that they were immune from the effect of Japanese actions in the "Near North," said Mr F. Milner, C.M.G., speaking last evening to the Canterbury Commercial Travellers' and Warehousemen's Association. Japan's ambitions in the Pacific and in China were a real threat; and her desire for expansion would not be satisfied with successes on the mainland of Asia. Professor Arnold Toynbee, the leading British authority on foreign affairs, had said that the complacency with which Australia and New Zealand regarded the Chinese question amazed him. They did not realise that the tiger, having sprung in China, would turn to the south. They could not flatter themselves that they were free from the implications of Japanese foreign policy. At present there was no danger of any sort; but success in China would so whet Japan's ambition that there would be no limit to her desire for dominance in the Pacific. The Japanese did entertain the idea that they were the only nation descended from the sun-god, that they

were destined to have the hegemony of the whole of Asia. The present attack by Japan must not be' regarded as an isolated phenomenon. It was part of a long premeditated design of Japan on China. Japan was aiming at economic control of China, of the metallic resources and agricultural and pastoral resources of the country. With Japan's scarcity of resources and pressure of population, her life-line was industrialisation, for which she required raw materials and markets. The Japanese were prepared to fight for these things. Under the constitution of Japan the Diet was merely a debating society, unable to control the influence of the naval and military chiefs on foreign policy. The military party in Japan looked to expansion in China; but the "navalist" party looked more for raw materials to Borneo and Malaya for oil and minerals; arid these the "navalists" thought a more attractive objective. It was this expansion to the south which was feared in Australia, and which made the progress of the Singapore Base so reassuring to Australians. For if a crisis occurred in the Pacific, Britain would need both Hong Kcng and Singapore. The pernicious doctrines of the totalitarian States were a menace to democracy and individualism for which Britain stood. No reliance could be placed to-day on the pledged word of nations, when pacts were broken as soon as they were made. In the challenge to democracy Britain was a trustee for the world for individualism; she was allied in that with France and Czechoslovakia. What would happen in Russia remained to be seen. One ray of hope was that the United States, in the perilous days for democracy, were beginning to realise that if Britain went down, America would go next Co-operation was growing between the two countries. The time was coming when Britain would need the help of America.