CHINA’S FINANCES.

Waikato Times, Volume 108, Issue 18166, 3 November 1930, Page 4

CHINA’S FINANCES.

Judge Linebarger is en "oute to Washington as the special representative of the President of China, as the Dictator of the Nanking Government is' somewhat ambiguously called, in order, it is stated, to negotiate an enormous loan for that country with the United States of America. The sum total hoped for is given as 1,000,000,000 ounces of silver, or, roughly, at the present price of thac commodity, about £74,000,000. M’ Linebarger is described as being the personal envoy of Marshal Chiang Kai Shek, and. the object of the loan is said to be the rehabilitation of the whole of China. Some very extravagant claims and proposals have emanated from China in recent years, but the latest is surely one of outstanding audacity. In the first place the idea of a loan being granted to Chang for the rehabilitation of the “ whole of China ” would be ridiculous on the face of it. Chiang controls a very small proportion of China, and a dwindling area even at that. He has no right to speak for a country the majority of which is completely independent of any of the dictates of Nanking. Millions of dollars have already poured through the coffers of the psuedo president and his family. Of these millions only a mere fraction was devoted to the betterment of China. After the experience of the immediate past in China there is no reason ta suppose that even should the loan be granted it will be set to any useful purpose. For a united China, certainly, it might provide the means of stabilising the currency ot the country, and provided, also, that concrete guarantees were given, not otherwise. The fall in the price of silver has dealt a severe blow to China and Hongkong and any relief to the situation would go a long way to place their trade on a better basis, but peace must first come internally before anything can be accomplished. There is, however, always the possibility that Washington following the accepted custom of the United States will grant the loan in the endeavour to gain an economic stranglehold on the country. Disappointed in the result of the revolution engineered by .Chinese students who had been educated and instilled with propaganda in American schools and universities, and unable to gain the ascendancy in Far Eastern commence by ordinary means, there remains this way for America to secure China unto herself.