JAPANESE IMPERIALISM.

Evening Star, Issue 22202, 3 December 1935, Page 8

JAPANESE IMPERIALISM.

Japan not long ago was a self-contained island empire, happy and contented in her isolation. Now the conditions have changed entirely. She is a country dominated by the military caste struggling to keep and enlarge her prestige as a first-class Power. There is some justification for her aims, if not for her methods, in her adventures on the mainland. Because of her congested and ever-growing population she must either expand or burst. Japan is a poor country. She has few natural resources. As a result of her entry into world affairs, which really began with the war against Russia, she is involved in vast expenditure on her fighting services. Consequently the Government is faced with acute Budget troubles. The civilian members of the Cabinet are continually demanding retrenchment. Their success is negligible, for the military party almost invariably gets its way. An instance of this is just recorded, a message from Tokio stating that the Budget provisions include Japan’s largest peace-time naval and military expenditure, A question that awaits an answer in the country to-day is: Does Imperialism pay? In other words, do the actual and prospective advantages of establishing direct or indirect control over foreign territories outweigh the heavy overhead costs that are an inevitable part of establishing such control and maintaining it against any possible challenge? The Manchurian occupation has been an extremely expensive undertaking, for since it began the national debt has increased by about 50 per cent., and there is no prospect of the financial obligations on the mainland becoming less. The outlying Japanese garrisons in Manchukuo have to police a wide expanse of territory in which guerrilla bandits are still active. This in itself is a costly.business. A further burden is that effective Japanese control has to be maintained in the demilitarised zone north of the Great Wall, and now Japan is actively intervening in the so-called autonomy movement in North China.

As a result of the obscurity of the position in this matter the British Government sought clarification of the Japanese attitude. The reply was delightfully vague and truly Oriental in its phrasing. It was that the movement was wholly Chinese and spontaneous, but that Japan as an interested party would watch developments. There is another matter .that has an important bearing on Japan’s Budget, and that is the question of naval construction. Tokio insists on naval parity with Britain and America. If Washington’s objections to this plan, which would mean overwhelming strategic superiority for Japan in Far Eastern waters, were conceded, a further strain on the Japanese finances would be entailed by the initiation of a greatly enlarged naval programme. Thus Japan is scarcely in a financial position to take up burdens in North China that would equal those in Manctmkuo. There have been intensive and costly developments in this new State, notably in such fields as railroad and road building, and municipal construction in Hsinking, the capita], and other towns, whicli have enlarged the market for Japanese goods and created new opportunities for labour and capital. Japan’s exports to Manchukuo have grown remarkably. Last year they absorbed about IS per cent, of her exports, it is, however, largely. $ one-

way trade, owing to the attitude of vested business interests in Japan, which vigorously protest against the competition of certain Manchurian products. Japanese financiers resent this, because they have lent much money to Manchurian enterprises. It will be seen that difficulties obtrude themselves all round. In the meantime, while military activity is so pronounced, a large section of the people are in dire straits. The big manufacturing centres are better off, but the acute distress in the rural regions, of which the northern provinces furnish the worst but by no means the sole examples, is a major cause of much social ferment in Japan. This has found expression in the formation of many extremist groups, and in a number of assassinations and attempts at assassination.