THE OTHER SIDE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23332, 26 October 1937, Page 10

THE OTHER SIDE

JAPAN LOOKS AT CHINA VISITING JOURNALIST’S VIEWS “It is a great pity that public opinion in Australia and New Zealand should be swayed by propaganda emanating from Chinese sources,” said Mr Bunshirow Suzuki, editor-in-chief of a prominent Japanese journal, who is at present visiting New Zealand on a health trip, in conversation with an Otago Daily Times representative last evening The Chinese, he added, are masters of propaganda, and he expressed the opinion that the large gaps in the information being received from China, when compared with outside messages, should make people in this part of the world wary of placing too much reliance on them. The Chinese were a race, he said, with an outlook quite different from the English. Two or three thousand years ago they had enjoyed a wonderful civilisation, but they were now decadent China was no longer a nation; it was a vast territory, and in it the laws held good only in certain parts In the popular cartoons dealing with the present conflict China was depicted as an old man and Japan as an aggressive young man Human sympathy was naturally with the apparently weaker side, but in this case the picture was fallacious. Kindness and generosity were interpreted by the Chinese mind as signs of weakness. In the relationships between China and Japan in Manchuria this had been so. In Manchuria the Chinese had totally disregarded the rights of the Japanese people. Manchuria was not Chinese territory, but a sort of independent country ruled by its own war lords, and the development of Manchuria into the autonomous State of Manchukuo was not an annexation of that territory by Japan, as it had sometimes been represented to be. Behind the current events, Mr Suzuki said, could be seen the Red hand of the Soviet. It was strange, that until 1935 General Chiang Kaishek had been actively engaged in attempting to stamp out Communism in China, and now he was in union with the Reds. This united front, the visitor claimed, was merely a matter of policy on either side, and there was no real depth of sincerity behind it. Each party was still seeking to turn the conflict to its own advantage. Japan was very alive to the menace of Communism in Asia and realised that it could not tolerate that the vast area of China should become Red, lying as it did in close proximity to Japan. It was partly this realisation which had given the military party its present dominance in his country, Mr Suzuki added. It was a party headed by far-sighted and patriotic leaders, whose ambition was only the welfare of their country. Prince Konoye was far from being a dictator." He was a liberal-minded man, and the customary forms of parliamentary government were observed by his Ministry. Mr Suzuki expressed his belief that in time party politics, as they had previously existed in Japan, would return, although it might be a matter of even 10 years before the feeling of emergency had passed.