JAPANESE DREAM

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 150, 22 December 1938, Page 8

JAPANESE DREAM

FIGHT WITH BRITAIN

NAVAL OFFICER'S BOOK

(From "The Post's" Representative.)

NEW YORK, November 23,

"Japan Must Fight Britain" is the title of a book written by an active Japanese naval officer, Lieut-Com-mander Tota Ishimaru. It is intended to be read in the light of the conviction, gradually gaining strength in Japan, that Chinese resistance is bolstered by the British, and that the present war on China masks a struggle against Britain. The writer predicts victory for Japan, assuming that the United States and Russia remain neutral, and that Japan can strike before the British battle fleet arrives at Singapore. The author recalls that the secret of Japan's victory over Russia in 1904 was that she struck at Vladivostok while the Russian fleet was in Europe.

Ishimaru's plan is for an initial blow at the Suez Canal, either by rebellion in Egypt, or among the Arabs, or by blocking the canal with submerged ships. A Japanese squadron would occupy Darwin, for use as an air and submarine base. British North Borneo would be occupied for a similar purpose. After these "preliminaries," the Japanese fleet would steam towards India, to engage the British fleet, which is expected to arrive, not by way of the canal, but around the Cape. The defeat of the British main fleet would be followed by the capture of Singapore and Hong Japan would then realise her secret ambition of dominating Asia.

Although the book is regarded in many quarters as a pipe dream, it is known that the United States is rearming rapidly for the chief reason that continued complications with Japan will lead to war. As we write, the Japanese Government has rejected the demand of Great Britain, the United States, and France, that their trading rights shall be respected under the Nine-Power Treaty, which guaranteed the continuance of the "Open Door." Japan's reply says, in affect, that the "open door" was closed when Japan occupied Manchuria. It is closed still more firmly under the changed conditions which have brought about the occupation by Japan of all China's seaports and the bulk of its trading terrain.