INTERVENTION IN SIBERIA.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 14572, 6 April 1918, Page 9

INTERVENTION IN SIBERIA.

JAPAN WILL PLAY THE GAME. OPINION OF ENGLISH [ SCHOLAR. The question of intervention by Japan in Siberia was discussed, in an interview, by Professor Murdoch, lecturer in Japanese history at the Sydney University, who has jtist returned to Sydney from Japan. Professor Murdoch has spent 30 years of- .his life in that country. 7 - , , , "Up to the present," he said, "the difficulties which liave militated against the Japanese taking, a more active part iu the war have, been, thosp. of coirimunications, which might have been cut at any time ; the language difficulty, which \yiis ayery considerable one; and the big on*e of transport. These difficulties,' however, only, applied ■ when the fighting fronts were remote from Japan herself. In the case of intervention in Siberia, all these difficulties disappear. Japan has only been withheld froni intervention before, by t*he unfounded suspicions of European Powers and of America. < "Now that she- has a mandate from these Powers she will move at once! Her attitude, too; ,\ve may rest assured, . will be a perfectly- honorable'- -'one to her allies. We may trust the Japanese Government to play, the game. "Of course among a population'Vof 60,000,000 people which Japan has thefce are all sorts and conditions of men, and there has. been certainly some sympathy among some of them for Germany ; but ' I repeat tliat we can trust the Japanese Government to play the game. Jt has done so up till now, and there is no reason why it should not. continue to do 60 f " ' I