The Press THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 1940. The Indo-China Situation

Press, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23129, 19 September 1940, Page 6

The Press THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 19, 1940. The Indo-China Situation

A possibly sinister development in the diplomatic battle now being waged over the future of French Indo-China is that Thailand (Siam) has demanded a “ rectification ” of the Thailand-Indo-China boundary which would involve substantial territorial concessions to Thailand. This demand arises out of a boundary dispute which goes back into last century. Last May, however, Thailand concluded a non-aggression pact with France which was commonly taken to mean that the Thailand Government, anxious to avoid becoming involved in such disputes as the war seemed likely to give rise to in the Far East, had accepted the boundary with IndoChina as final. This wise attitude has now been abandoned; and Thailand appears to be playing the same part in relation to Indo-China as Hungary played in relation to Rumania. The change may be due merely to short-sighted opportunism; more probably it is due to Japanese influence. It can hardly be an accident that Thailand’s demands coincide with the publication in Hong Kong newspapers of a report that the nature of Japan’s demands against Indo-China has completely changed. According to these reports, Japan is now seeking a partition of the colony, the northern province of Tonking to become a Japanese possession, the province of Annam to become a buffer area, and the southern provinces to remain in French hands. Possession of Tonking would give Japan the port of Haiphong and the railway connecting Hanoi with Kunming and thus enable her to launch a flank attack on the military strongholds of “free China.” Partition, obviously enough, is a solution which would suit Thailand much better than the establishment of some measure of Japanese control over the colony as a whole. It is also possible that Japan hopes that by confining (for the time being at any rate) her expansionist ambitions to the northern extremity of Indo-China she will be less likely to find herself in difficulties with Great Britain and the United States, who regard the possibility of a Japanese naval establishment at Cam! Ranh Bay, in close proximity to the Dutch East Indies, with undisguised alarm. The, unknown factor in this complex situation is the attitude of the Vichy Government, over which the German Government must be assumed to have great influence. In the meantime, there is an interesting and cryptic official announcement from Washington that Indo-China was among the subjects discussed at a conference between Mr Cordell Hull, United States Secretary of State, and Lord Lothian and Mr Casey, A Reuter message infers from the presence of the Australian Minister that the United States is contemplating a defence agreement with Australia on the lines of the agreement with Canada. Such an inference is probably well ahead of the facts. But the Japanese press has in recent weeks been discussing with.manifest anxiety the possibility of an agreement between the United States and Australia; and it may be that Washington is not unwilling that the Japanese Government should see such an agreement as a possible consequence of aggressive action in Indo-China.