THE The New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS MONDAY, JULY 10, 1939 THE FAR EAST THREAT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 23394, 10 July 1939, Page 8

THE The New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS MONDAY, JULY 10, 1939 THE FAR EAST THREAT

llksitancy in the prosecution of plans for the defence of her rich colonial Empire is the main reason why Holland to-day finds herself a country temporarily without a Government. The Colijn Ministry resigned on June 29 as a result of the refusal of the Prime Minister to accept the demands of the Catholic Ministers in his Cabinet and borrow for defence. Dr. Colijn was requested by Queen Wilhelinina to form a new Government, but so far his efforts have not succeeded and the latest reports from The Hague state that the Queen is anxiously discussing the situation with the heads of the defence forces and with a former Governor of the Netherlands East Indies. The protection of Dutch interests in the Far East is, of course, the main point at issue. Amid all the turmoil of Europe, Holland is determined not to lose her head and the spirit of an industrious and peaceful people finds expression in the demarche issued only last week by the Netherlands Ministers in Paris and London rejecting possible guarantees of Dutch security by Britain and France. Even without a Government, Holland feels confident in insisting on her traditional neutrality in European affairs. But the Far East is another matter. Colonial possessions, fabulously rich in oil, rubber and a wide variety of valuable minerals, are at stake. Without that colonial wealth, Holland's status among the nations would diminish almost to vanishing point and for that reason, if for no other, the Dutch have watched with gloomy foreboding the recent Japanese penetration down through the China Seas toward that vulnerable archipelago which forms the Netherlands East Indies.

For many years Holland felt convinced that her footing in the Far East was secure. She had rich possessions which in the main were well administered. Protection was needed, of course, but even in 1930 the programme for Dutch naval defence in the Malay Archipelago was confined to a relatively small force of light cruisers, destroyers and submarines. Three years later the world depression forced a demand for economies on that modest basis, but before long it was realised that the 1930 programme was inadequate. In the meantime, Dutch commercial shipping interests in the Far East had been subjected to increasing Japanese competition. The Government of the Netherlands East Indies did pot hesitate to accept the challenge by insisting that merchants in its territory should support their own mercantile marine. Trade between Japan and the Netherlands East Indies had been steadily expanding, but the Dutch, with Government support, showed considerable skill in negotiating the 1936 freight agreement which defeated the attempts of Japanese shipping lines to obtain a preponderant influence in the JavaJapan carrying trade. Economic penetration from Tokio was thus, in a sense, halted, but it was not long before the menace appeared on another front. It began to be realised at The Hague that the expansionist aims of Japan were such that the Malay Archipelago, with shipping routes converging in narrow channels between the islands, might become the theatre of a future war for raw materials. And so there has arisen in the Netherlands a widespread demand for "preventive" naval strength in the Far East. It has taken shape in plans for the building of a new East Indies fleet of four 25,000-ton battleships and six 8000-ton cruisers ; for enlarging the naval base at Sourabaya; and for increasing the air strength by the addition of 72 modern flying-boats. The first announcement of the plan caused the resignation of the Dutch Minister of Finance, Dr. J. A. de Wilde, and now Dr. Colijn is tending to agree with his erstwhile colleague that the financing of defence plans costing £38,000,000 is not an easy matter.

All these questions have an interest and importance extending far beyond Holland and her colonies. Japan is moving steadily southward, not in merchant vessels, but in ships of war. She has occupied the Pratas Shoals, a group of small islands only 150 miles from Hongkong; she has seized and is now engaged in fortifying, the large Chinese island of Hainan, standing on the sea route from Singapore to Hongkong and overlooking important ports in French Indo-China; she has raised the Japanese flag on the Paracel Islands, south of Hainan and strategically placed between French IndoChina and the Philippines; she has gone 500 miles further south and annexed the Spratley Island group, advancing her naval position by more than 1000 miles from Formosa. If the Japanese advance is to continue —and everything suggests that it is—the ndxt objective must be the fairly large and wealthy Natuna Islands, an outlying and isolated part of the Dutch East Indies, entirely undefended. There would then be an imposing line of advanced bases, reaching its spearhead at a point which would place Japanese bombers within an hour's flight of Singapore and which would provide tho key of the ocean doorday to Sumatra, Java, Borneo and all those other Dutch possessions where oil and timber, rubber and tin abound. Along with Great Britain, France and the United States, Holland is in a position where she cannot afford to remain unconcerned. The Dutch have this thought to console them—that a naval Avar in tho Far East must ultimately see Japan opposed by three of the great Powers and that the aggressor will have to employ a much greater force of ships than the force opposed, to him^