CIVIL WAR IN CHINA

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19269, 5 September 1924, Page 7

CIVIL WAR IN CHINA

FIGHTING COMMENCES. NOT OF A SERIOUS CHARACTER. Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright. PEKING, September t>. Fighting commenced to-day at Hwangtu, 20 miles from Shanghai, on the Shanghai-Nanking Railway. No details are available owing to scanty communications and a strict censorship. The lighting up to the present has not been heavy. Every precaution is being taken to protect the foreign settlements, and there seems to be no cause for anxiety in that connection. The first foreign Power to land force was France, 80 marines from the Jules Ferry having been landed at the Trench concessions this afternoon.—Reuter. A message to the Australian papers from Shanghai on August 26 stated: Rumours of the imminence of war between the provinces of Che-kiang and Kiang-su have been in the air for some time. The Peking Government says that a censorship has hen instituted on Peking news. Movements of Kiang-su troops to the .rent from Nanking are believed to mean war. Broadly, the origin of the trouble lies in the fact that Ueneral Lu-Yang-haiang the military Governor of Che-kiang, controls the Shanghai arsenal, just outside the Chinese city, and the Woosung forts, Shanghai, Marshal Chih-Sioh-yuan, the military Governor of Kiang-su, has always maintained that these places, being in Kiang-su, ought to be under his control. The trouble was recently brought to a head by Lu-Yung-hsiang annoying General Wu-Pei-fu (inspector-general of Chihli, Shantung, and Honan) by lucratively employing two anli-Wu-Pei-fu generals. Marshal Wu-Pei-fu is backing Chih-Sieh-yuau, and Chang-Tso-lin is believed to bo backing Lu-Yung-hsiang, but it is uncertain in each case how far. The danger of the situation lies in the nearness of the Shanghai scene. What is happening in China 'a a struggle for power between three men— Sun-Yat-sen in South China, Chang TsoHn, in Manchuria, and Wu-Pie-fu in Central China. Sun-Yat-sen, who is in alliance with Chang, is the least powerful of the three, for his control of the province of Kwang-tuiuj is disputed by Chen Ch’iung-ming, an able henchman of Wu. Morally, however, his influence is very considerable, for he is the most important figure in a group of exceedingly able Cantonese, Chang-Tso-lin and Wu-Pei-fu ar<j the big protagonists. They have fought one another before, and it was expected that they would light each other again. Their struggle is for the control of Peking, and the central Government, which is at present in the hands of the Chihli party, of which Wu-Pei-fu is the , principal champion. At one time it was thought that Chang-Tso-lin might try to descend on Peking from Mukden, a move which Wu-Pei-fu would certainly endeavour to stop. Earlier this year fighting took place in Szechuan, where wiu-Pei-fu’s followers struggled for mastery against Szechuan, Yunan, and Kweichow troops. To put an end to civil strife and inaugurate an era of peace is said to be Wu-Pei-fu s genuine aim. A highly-placed Chinese in Peking recently stated, however, that on neither side is anything more to be found than a desire for power and the money which power in China brings with it—for example, in Szechuan, whence so much of the salt revenue comes in hia view Chang-Tso-lin, Wu-Pc-i-fu and Sun-Aat-sen are but the leaders of hosts ot selfseekers ready to supplant or succeed them as opportunity offers. He declared that he could see no hone whatever of peace or unification, and he considered it unlikely that Wu-Pei-fu would succeed in dominating China for any length ot time. The most he was willing to concede was the possibility of his temporary dominance, to be followed by a renewal of strife and disunion.