WAR MATERIALS FROM U.S.

Southland Times, Issue 24368, 24 February 1941, Page 5

WAR MATERIALS FROM U.S.

Shipments To Japan To Be Restricted (United Press Assn.—Telegraph Copyright) (Received February 23, 9.30 p.m.) NEW YORK, February 22. The Washington oerrespondent of the New York Herald-Tribune states that Mr Roosevelt will issue within two or three days a new proclamation placing a dozen or more items under a licence system. The move is primarily designed to restrict shipments to Japan of materials with a possible war use. Restrictions will also operate against the Soviet to curb shipments which have been reaching Germany, via Siberia. The list is expected to include sole leather, carbon, black jute, shellac, borax, glycerine and vegetable oils. A message from Washington says that Colonel Frank Knox, Secretary of the Navy, has announced that 461,000 men and 35,000 officers are needed to man

the two-ocean navy of 650 warships and 15,000 planes. Recruiting is being speeded up at the rate of 6500 monthly. According to a message from Indianapolis, Mr Wendell Willkie said that he would probably not go to China as previously indicated. A message from Tokyo says that the Japanese south seas fleet has issued a communique that the Burma route is completely cut off where it crosses the upper Mekong river as a result of the bombing of two Kungkuo bridges, which were abandoned. There is no evidence of repairs being undertaken. According to a Shanghai message, Japanese newspapers report that the Chungking Government has obtained British approval for a joint ChineseBritish defence plan extending from south-western China to India. The Shanghai correspondent of The New York Times reports that, although Japanese naval squadrons continue to patrol Indo-Chinese and Siamese shores, Japanese politicians and business men associated with the import trade are opposed to further war-like efforts. They are willing to accept their losses in China and desire to regain the industrial prosperity attained during and after the first world war. “UNDIMINISHED AID” Mr Wang Chung-Hui, Foreign Secretary in the Chiang Kai-shek administration, declared that the aid given to China by Russia was expected to continue undiminished. He expressed doubt concerning the possibility of Russia signing a non-aggression pact with Japan in the near future. The Japanese Foreign Secretary, Mr Yosuke Matsuoka, explained that he had sent a memorandum to the British Foreign Secretary, Mr Anthony Eden, refuting the British claims that Japan sought to dominate the Far East. He emphasized that, as Japan was mediating in the Indo-China dispute, so she was willing to mediate anywhere else in the world. This was merely a general statement of a peaceful desire and was quite different from a specific offer to mediate in Europe.

A message from Shanghai states that the Japanese Army Spokesman, Major Kunio Akiyama, at a Press conference, said that Japan was like a dove of peace, but that Britain and America were like “snakes placing snakes’ eggs in the dove’s nest.’’ He said that Japan’s reaction was to “protest very vigorously.”

The interpreter added that Major Akiyama “means nothing unkindly when he calls Britain and America snakes.”

Major Akiyama said that the snakes’ eggs included the fortification of Singapore and Guam, and the arrival of the Australians in Malaya. He added that Britain and America were making an effort to “impose the status quo upon Japan,” whereas actually Britain and America had first been guilty of breaking the Pacific status quo—the former when she abrogated the Anglo-Japanese alliance and the latter when she abrogated the Japano-American Commercial Treaty. He said that Japan had always been victimised.

He added that all the talk of war in the Pacific “centres on the eastern side of the Pacific, whereas in the western. Pacific everyone is crying for peace.” Asked whether the Japanese had planned, or were planning countermeasures to the arrival of the Australians in Malaya, Major Akiyama said: “Not so far as the army is concerned.” However, the navy spokesman declined to comment on the same question as far as the navy was concerned.