PREPARING FOR WAR

Evening Post, Volume CXXXII, Issue 31, 5 August 1941, Page 8

PREPARING FOR WAR

JAPANESE MOVING

ENCIRCLEMENT CLAIM

"MUST MARCH ON"

(By, Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright.)

(Rec. 2 p.m.) NEW YORK, August 4. Mr. Otto D. Tolischus, Tokio correspondent of the "tfew York Times," reports to that newspaper that the Domei news agency says that Japan is considering herself to be encircled by the "A.8.C.D." Powers—America, Britain, China, and the Dutch—and is speeding up her mobilisation ftfr total war.

This means the country's military, political, economic, agricultural, industrial, and social structure, all of which are affected by,the/Imperial ordinances drafted by the Cabinet Planning Board. More than a dozen ordinances are now in preparation for the plenary session on Friday. The total war economy will be controlled by the

Government, but directed by the country's best business brains.

According to leading Japanese spokesmen, mobilisation is necessary because the "A.8.C.D." Powers are lining up to frustrate Japan's "divine mission of liberating the nations of greater. East Asia from the shackles of European and American capital."

The Japanese spokesmen put the responsibility of any disturbance of the peace in the Pacific on the "A.8.C.D." Powers. All the voices are becoming very pessimistic about whether such a disturbance can be avoided. Nevertheless, Japan is elated at the ease with which the peaceful occupation of Indo-China was carried out. The 'Japanese were received there with all the diplomatic courtesies, • and the French authorities provided them with the best buildings and the best barracks. All the Japanese spokesmen, so far as they are permitted to reach the public, declare that Japan has no choice but to march onward until the lofty goal which is now taught the children at the schools is attained. APPEAL TO KONOYE. In this chorus, today, a voice with a slightly different nuance was lifted up. Retsu Kiyosawa, a noted* political commentator, writing in the "Chugai Shogyo Shimpo," addresses an open letter to Prince Konoye and calls for the mobilisation of one of Japan's greatest assets—the national reputation of Prince Konoye—to overcome the present diplomatic crisis. Never in her long history has Japan been encircled by such a combination of Powers as today, he says, and flatly lays the responsibility on Prince Konoye's "magnanimous indifference." Nevertheless, Mr. Kiyosawa calls on the Prime Minister, first, to support and collaborate with the Foreign Minister, Vice-Admiral Toyoda, secondly, to clarify Japan's grand mission and objective in terms that the world j will understand. Mr. Kiyosawa points out that only by complete unity between the Prime Minister and the Foreign Minister were diplomatic crises mastered in the past. A Washington message says that the U.S. Secretary of State, Mr. Cordell Hull, at a Press conference, denounced recent foreign developments as demonstrating beyond doubt that the Axis sought world conquest, in an attempt which he said "can and will be resisted with unity of purpose and maximum effort."

The remaining free peoples would win, Mr. Hull said, and the victims of the forces of barbarism would he liberated.