JAPAN'S VIEW

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22974, 28 February 1938, Page 12

JAPAN'S VIEW

CONFLICT IN CHI# ■ f FIGHTING FOR LlF® M NEED FOR MORE LAND THE POPULATION PROBLEM ■ Tho need for Japan s point of view in her preset conflict with China was urged on Saturday by tho Right Re,v. Dr. J. a German Jesuit, who is BisWP Hiroshima, Japan, when ho arrived by tho Wanganella from Sydney | or the Catholic Centenary cclebrati?/ 18 - As he saw it, ho sai<?« the war was one of tho effects of if J a P an 8 ro °t problem of over-popul®ti° n< Success would ensure the coP^ nuanc ° an essential supply of materials and tho marketing of Japanese manufactures, but it would brfas °nly a partial solution of tho mai® problem. Bishop Ross said ho wished to speak of Japan as he saw her problems, lor ho was not capable of discussing tho political aspect. Room to Expand Essential Boom was needed by the Japanese to expand and if land was to bo obtained peaceably an international sympathy would have to be brought to bear' upon the problem, said Bishop Ross. No nation would suffer selfextinction, and unless they could cope with tho rapidly increasing population self-extinction would face the Japanese. If successful) the China war would enable Japan to provide her millions with more work and to this extent it would assist to solve the root problem, but land would still bo needed. This land had to have a suitable climate. Manchuria was almost useless for settlement, tho extremes of cold being little to the liking of the Japanese. Tens of thousands might go there, but not tho millions Japan had to export. For these a sub-tropical cliniato would have to be found. Where it would be, said Bishop Ross, he did not know, but there were thousands of uncultivated acres in such countries as Australia. Sympathy ior Japanese

Toward tho Japanese activities in China, ho said, there seemed to be unvarying antagonism by those countries which had not experienced the problems facing Japan. For tho peace ofthe, world and tho jjood of mankind it was desirable that more than one side of tho question should be examined.' The problem was not beyond solution, ho believed, and it was necessary that an attempt should be made, perhaps by international action, to understand tho Japanese viewpoint and to meet their desire for more land. There was something to be said for the Japanese attitude to their present conflict with China. He thought there was much to bo said for it. Tho Japanese viewed the whqje affair as an act of self-preservation. To cope with their relatively small area of arable land and their gigantic population, the Japanese had largely industrialised their lifo. If this was to servo its purpose raw materials and markets wero obviously needed. Both these wero to bo found in China and tho Japanese wero convinced, as the bishop had read in Japan, that rights to them which had been guaranteed in the past had now been set aside and disregraded, greatly because of Communistic influences. As a result tho conflict resolved itself into an attempt to safeguard and preserve these rights which were essential to tho partial solution of the root problem of over-popula-* tion. .