CHINA’S CHAOS

Dominion, Volume 25, Issue 80, 29 December 1931, Page 8

CHINA’S CHAOS

Stability Still Far Off DANGER OF COMMUNISM “When one looks back on the past history of China it seems a great mistake that Britain abandoned its Hankow and Tientsin concessions,” said Mr. H. von Haast when interviewed yesterday on his return from the conference of the Institute of Pacific Relations at Shanghai, to which he was one of the New Zealand delegates. The Chinese misunderstood any desire of the British people to meet them halfway, Mr. von Haast said. They took it as a sign of weakness. AU foreigners, so far as he could learn, had a great deal of sympathy for China and a desire to see unification brought about in the country, under a stable Government.

“But so far as I could see, a stable Government there is far from fruition yet,” he said. “It appears doubtful if the attempt of the Chinese to graft Western civilisation on to their old life and traditions is not a case of putting new wine into old bottles. It appears doubtful if it is possible to carry out the Western codes—and they are very good codes —which have been adopted in China. It is a country that can scarcely be loked upon as a consolidated one—it is a series of more or less independent provinces. Its great need is stable Government in those provinces; then it needs the administration of law and order, the administration of/Westtern ideas, together with the preserving of Chinese customs and traditions. And when that is established it needs some sort of federal government.” “It looks as though the best method would be the appearance of a strong dictator, with a well disciplined army at his disposal,” Mr. von Haast said. “He would require to restore law and order, to extirpate the brigands and institute some system of stable government. The danger is al present, with such a state of disunifleation existing. th.it a wave of communism will sweep, over China.”