The new Japanese peril

Foreword

The following pages are intended to bring the discussion of the Japanese question, begun by the writer in The Problem of Japan (1918) and continued in The Isolation of Japan (191 9), down to date.

While it is, perhaps, difficult for those who have made a study of Far Eastern questions to preserve a non-partisan and impartial attitude, particularly where, as in the present discussion, the future supremacy of the white races is shown to be endangered, the author has endeavoured to retain as objective a point of view as is consistent with his natural feelings as a member of the Western family of nations against whom the new Japanese peril may come to be directed.

The reader is warned that in presenting his views, as herein set forth, the author makes no claim to consistency in his treatment of various aspects of the subjects discussed. Such a thing as consistency would, in this relation, be impossible, for the reason that the writer endeavours to picture future developments from at least more than one standpoint. Particularly in his presentation of the problems and tendencies that are vi THE NEW JAPANESE PERIL

involved in the proposed renewal of the Anglo- Japanese Treaty of Alliance, the author has attempted to discuss the probable consequences in relation to each turn of events and in conjunction with each new set of circumstances. For example, the question of whether Great Britain favours a renewal of the Treaty depends on world conditions which are changing, and what her ultimate decision in the matter will be depends on the world situation at the very moment she is called upon to make her choice. Similarly, Japan's attitude towards Britain depends upon factors which are constantly subject to change.

Accordingly, it has been the writer's purpose to pursue no dogmatic view of the probable course of events, but rather to present varying phases with their probable consequences, and, most important of all, to awaken new trains of thought in the reader's mind on this most important of subjects.

In order that there should be no menace to the peace of the world arising out of Japan's policy in the Far East, it would be necessary for her to reverse her policy and go in the opposite direction. Does anyone believe she will do it? If she will not, and continues to advance in the direction she is moving, then the Far Eastern question bids fair to grow into a menace that will include the whole world within its orbit.

Reliance on treaties there can be none, nor in the principle of peaceful development. The fight

FOREWORD vii

of the peoples for freedom, democracy and the rights of nations has not yet been won. Those rights will still have to be defended in the Pacific.

Much encouragement has been derived by the writer in his present task out of the fact that many of the views expressed by him, in the former publications above referred to, have been justified by subsequent events. Indeed, the swiftness with which epoch-making transactions have followed upon one another has made the art of forecast an unusually difficult one. It is unfortunate that it is not possessed to a greater degree by the statesmen who now pretend to govern us. What is needed is some of the prescience of a Disraeli, who in 1879 wrote the Marquis of Salisbury a letter in which he gave utterance to the prediction, startling for that time, that England, under certain conditions, would some day be fighting by the side of Russia and France against the Central Powers. That was a long look ahead, and remarkable by reason of the fact that British policy had been particularly anti-Russian during Disraeli's premiership and so remained down to the Entente of 1907.

In this, the greatest crisis of affairs in history, Western civilization might yet be saved by a statesman with the genius and imagination of a Disraeli or a Lincoln. Some magic touch is needed to electrify the world — to convey to it an interpretation of the mysterious messages spoken viii THE NEW JAPANESE PERIL

in an unknown tongue with which the entire atmosphere of the East is laden, and to make vivid, as a flash of lightning, the meaning of a distant and gathering sound that approaches with the steadiness and uniformity of a caravan moving in the solitary wastes of the desert — a sound of the measured tramp of feet and of the rumbling thunder of heavy guns.

Contents

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Foreword v

CHAPTER

Chapter One Japan Develops Her Par Eastern Programme

Nothing could have been more opportune for Japan than the outbreak of the great European War. After having successfully fought two wars within a decade, whereby she had managed to assert in the one her superiority over another branch of the Yellow Race and in the other her ability to stand up against and finally vanquish, in one of the most sanguinary wars in history, a very prominent member of the European Concert of the white nations, Japan found herself a decade later still struggling painfully to overcome her most formidable handicap as a nation, namely, her financial situation as a debtor nation, with difficulty in making both ends meet and forced to ask new loans of Western creditors.

The fundamental problem for Japan had been to increase her imports above her exports. For in raw materials, having little coal and less iron, the two elements upon which all modern industry chiefly rests, Japan's progress and expansion depended for a very large part upon her ability to control sufficiently large sources of these supplies.

Not having them at home, they must be sought upon the mainland. Rival nations must be prevented from anticipating Japan's wishes and thus staying her development.

The first step, therefore, was to secure a right to intervene in China, a right which some of the Western nations, with much less excuse, had already assumed for themselves, in defiance in some cases of China's assertion of her inalienable rights of sovereignty.

The second step was taken in the war with Russia, which was fought primarily to free Japan from the too close proximity of a formidable rival who might seize for herself the very things Japan so greatly coveted, and of which she had so much need.

Of a sudden, in August 1914, came the great boon for the Island Empire, still struggling to consolidate her position on the mainland, in Korea and Manchuria, and still intriguing to extend her privileges and claims over other domains of the Chinese, in the same manner as she had made Korea and South Manchuria subservient to her wishes. The European War seemed destined, in large measure, not only to solve Japan's pressing financial problems, but likewise to make easy,

JAPAN'S FAR EASTERN PROGRAMME 8

while her Western rivals were engaged in butchering one another, Japan's intervention policies on the mainland.

The writer has already in two publications from his pen (The Problem of Japan and The Isolation of Japan) described the process by which Japan, during the course of the war, succeeded in attaining to a very large measure of her projected designs, namely, the hegemony of the Yellow Race and a controlling voice in the future destinies of the Far East. And yet the sudden ending of the war in November 1918, with the totally unexpected and unwished-for capitulation of the Central Powers, put Japan in a position that was not entirely free from embarrassment.

Japan's statesmen had reckoned that the war would end either in a draw or, at the very least, in an indecisive victory for the Western Powers which would leave Germany still master of her fate. In such an event it was felt that Japan's role at the ensuing Peace Conference would be almost that of an umpire, and that her prestige and influence would, in this fact, reach such a height that all resistance to her demands to control the future fate of China and the Far East would be lightly swept aside.

The lightning-like succession of events, however, which brought about the complete collapse of the Central Powers now threatened to upset entirely Japan's well-devised plans and even to put her position as a Great Power to the proof, for England and America were now to be the dictators of the Peace, and between them possessed the argument of irresistible force and power with which to give weight to their wishes. Moreover each of these nations (too loyal to the European contest to engage themselves elsewhere) was smarting under the consciousness that they had upon more than one occasion been compelled to yield to the arrogant claims and demands of Japan in the Far East and to accept at her hands a policy which was in flagrant derogation of their own interests.

It would have been better for Japan had she remembered that Britain never forgets nor forgives a slight or trespass against her Imperial prestige. When the time comes to settle accounts, Japan will find that England has not forgotten how the Land of the Rising Sun took advantage of her engagements elsewhere to undermine her national and economic interests in China. Nor will England hesitate to remind Japan that she, Britain's ally, had permitted a bitter press campaign to be conducted against the British partner of the Anglo- Japanese Alliance, at one of the most critical moments of the entire war, when the Allies were being violently attacked in the West and the Russians were falling back in the East (Verdun — first half of 191 6). The check everywhere to the British arms — at Gallipoli, in Mesopotamia, and

JAPAN'S FAR EASTERN PROGRAMME 5

in the naval battle at Jutland — came in for a severe scoring at the hands of the wily Nipponese, whereas the great achievements of the German arms were correspondingly exalted and the latter's spirit held to be above all praise. Indeed, a part of the Japanese press even went so far as to suggest that the time had at last come for Japan boldly to denounce the Anglo- Japanese Alliance, or at least to demand its revision. That these recriminations are not to be attributed to the emanations of merely irresponsible organs of public opinion, uncontrolled by the public authorities, is plain, for it is a fact that the newspapers in Japan, as in no other country, are entirely subservient to the Government, particularly when questions of foreign policy are mooted, and in this instance the press of the seat of Government, Tokio, with hardly an exception, joined in the hue and cry.

For many months this agitation continued, and only ceased when the danger of a German breakthrough at Verdun had been overcome and England once more felt herself strong enough to lodge a protest, in vigorous language, with Baron Ishii, the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs. That this was a serious attempt to bring about the abrogation of the Alliance when it had more than half of its duration yet to run and in war-time, in direct violation of the explicit terms of the Treaty, there can be no doubt. And what made the thing especially galling to the British Imperialist was the fact that this Japanese agitation was a demonstration to the world that in the opinion of the Japanese the English were not doing particularly well in the war, and that therefore Japan could do better for herself in China if no agreement existed.

In reality, all of this agitation was put up as a screen to cover a bad case of troubled conscience. For, at the very time this press campaign against Japan's ally was going on, Japanese statesmen were negotiating a secret treaty with Russia, which was intended to, and does in effect, nullify the Anglo- Japanese Agreement. It will be remembered that the Anglo- Japanese Treaty of Alliance was first entered into in 1902, and renewed with modifications in 1905 and 1911, the last time for a period of ten years. The renewal in 1 91 1 was for England no longer a matter of the far-reaching importance which the earlier agreements had possessed, for the reason that England had already, in 1907, come to an understanding with Russia over nearly all existing matters of difference, and from thenceforth directed her diplomacy towards checking the advance of Germany. Russia and France were no longer her antagonists in Asia and in Africa. Britain, that up to 1904 had been working hand-in-glove with Germany against France in Morocco and with Germany against Russia in Persia, now abandoned

JAPAN'S FAR EASTERN. PROGRAMME 7

her former associate, and in exchange for a free hand in Egypt, granted by France, and a sphere of influence in Persia, granted by Russia, composed all differences with Russia and France, and entered upon an entirely new diplomatic course which culminated in the outbreak of the great European War. The prior crisis in affairs in 1911, ending in a Conference of the Powers at Algeciras, and the two Balkan Wars of 1912 and 1913 were but preludes to the enactment of the much greater drama upon which the curtain was to rise in August 1 914.

Now, then, the point we wish to make is that the Anglo- Japanese Alliance was directed, so far as both England and Japan were concerned, against the aggressions of Russia in Asia. England feared for India and Japan feared for China and for her position of strength generally in the Far East. But after the Russo-Japanese War the Japanese position towards Russia rapidly changed, and they composed many of their differences and arranged a working partnership of the two nations in the Far East by the secret treaties of 1907, 1910, 1912. They had been driven into each other's arms primarily by the attitude of the United States towards the policy of the "Open Door" in China and particularly in Manchuria, where the former enemies, Russia and Japan, had mapped out "spheres of influence" for themselves along the lines of the South Manchurian

Railway to the harbours of Port Arthur and Dalny. In other words, Japan and Russia felt themselves compelled to display a united front against the insistent demands of the United States for the application of the policy of the "Open Door" and equal opportunities for trade in China and Manchuria.

In spite of Japan's growing enthusiasm for Russia, however, the Anglo- Japanese Alliance was still a vital factor in world affairs at the time of the outbreak of the Great War, and so remained, even in the eyes of Japanese statesmen, down to the summer of 1916, when at last Japan began to feel herself strong enough to cut the painter that tied her to England and tie up to her new ally, Russia. The Anglo- Japanese Alliance, which had been entered into for the purpose of putting a check on Russian aggression in Asia, was now to be replaced by the Russo-Japanese Alliance, which in effect declared China to be the concern of these two Powers, and of these two Powers alone. It was Japan's first great step in the direction of enforcing her new programme, so providentially favoured by the European War, of "Asia for the Asiatics." For Russia, like Japan, is a truly Asiatic Power, and is so regarded by all Asiatics. Japan's second and equally important step in the same direction was made when she succeeded, in 1 91 7, in winning over the United States to the recognition of her "special interests" in China,

JAPAN'S FAR EASTERN PROGRAMME 9

upon the occasion of the Baron Ishii mission to America.

With the right of the Asiatics to demand from Europeans and Americans that they accept such a programme (namely, "Asia for the Asiatics") we have no quarrel. It is solely a question of how the programme is to be carried out. If carried out in the same spirit and with the same high selflessness with which the United States applies the Monroe Doctrine to the Americas, then there is a great deal to be said for the doctrine of "Asia for the Asiatics"; but if the doctrine is carried out in the manner and spirit displayed by Japan towards all the world in China, Manchuria and Korea, and towards China in the matter of Japanese aggressions upon Chinese territorial integrity and China's sovereign rights as an independent nation, then the doctrine is an unjust and pernicious doctrine.

Chapter Two Developments Down To The Cessation Of Hostilities

It must be clear to every thinking American that the United States cannot, without stultifying itself and throwing overboard one of the most important planks in its foreign policy, permit Japan to apply the doctrine of "Asia for the Asiatics" in disregard and defiance of the principle of the "Open Door," first enunciated by John Hay as Secretary of State in 1899, and later accepted by the other Great Powers, including Japan, in various treaties entered into between those Powers and China and in sundry agreements entered into with one another. But it is greatly to be feared that this is precisely the course that Japan proposes to take in case the doctrine comes to be generally recognized, or rather, to express the matter more accurately, Japan will refuse to stop acting in disregard and defiance of the principle of the "Open Door" in the Far East. For in South Manchuria the "Open Door" has been a'closed

door for many years, due to the systematic exclu-

THE CESSATION OF HOSTILITIES 11

sion of all Western trade competition in this important Japanese sphere of influence.

Nor could the United States afford to stand at one side and permit Japan to assail and to violate the sovereignty of China, as she has done in the matter of the "twenty-one demands" presented to China on January 18, 1915, at a time when the other Great Powers had their hands tied by the European War and were unable to interfere.

Under these demands the land of the Mikado not only attempted to secure from the Chinese important politico-economic advantages in Shantung, South Manchuria and Eastern Inner Mongolia, but it likewise set over against China such demands as, had they been granted, would have reduced China to the position of a vassal State, and would necessarily have put an end to any and every influence possessed by the Western Powers in the Far East.

Fortunately, diplomatic pressure, exerted in the nick_of time by England and the United States, compelled the Government at Tokio to renounce, at least temporarily, some of its most far-reaching demands. The Japanese Government, nevertheless, could be well satisfied by the results attained, for it secured, after long negotiations, culminating with the ultimatum and threatened use of force of May 7, 1 915, such advantages as placed it in a position practically to dictate the future development of China and her dependency upon Japan

If THE NEW JAPANESE PERIL

in the more important essentials of her national life.

;-" s In the subsequent agreement that was signed between China and Japan on the 25 th of May, Japan succeeded to the rights of Germany in Shantung and was allowed to have a free hand in South Manchuria. By these manoeuvres Japan had managed to work out an encircling policy that included the capital, Peking, the province of Chili and all the sea approaches thereto, within its grasp, and an unassailable base from which to extend Japanese influence over further large tracts of China, including the command of the most important railways and waterways.

Following upon the imposition of the greater part of the "twenty-one demands" upon China, the Government at Tokio let no grass grow under its feet in its efforts further to consolidate its position. As already pointed out, Japan came to an understanding with Russia in 1916 as regards their future relations in China, and in 191 7 Japan succeeded in bringing England and France into line with Russia, by means of secret treaties, which guaranteed to Japan the support of those countries with respect to her claims as successor to Germany in Shantung and the German islands north of the Equator.

Naturally, the participation of the United States in the World War, coming after her declaration of war against Germany in April 1917, pro-

THE CESSATION OF HOSTILITIES 13

vided Japan with an opportunity of still further extending her sway over the future destinies of China, for on the 2nd of November of that year Baron Ishii was able to convince the American Government that it was no longer in a position to refuse to recognize the paramount interests of Japan in the Far East, and accordingly, as already referred to in our first chapter, the famous Ishii-Lansing Agreement was signed, in which America undertakes to recognize Japan's "special interests" in China. By this act the United States formally, albeit in the camouflaged language of diplomacy, abrogated the hitherto (next to the Monroe Doctrine) most dearly prized plank of her foreign policy, for, in spite of all attempts subsequently to weaken the force of the concession, it surely must be conceded that the acknowledgment of special rights in one nation is totally inconsistent with the principle of the "Open Door" and equal opportunities for all nations. Most to be criticized about the transaction is the fact that it placed the United States, for the first time in its history, open to the charge of violating without provocation the sovereignty of China. For China had not been consulted in the matter at all, and it was China's sovereign rights as an independent nation that were the subject-matter of the Ishii-Lansing Agreement.

But the close of the war has changed many things, and it is not alone the Japanese who are agitating themselves over the question: Will the United States continue to honour its signature to a document that departs so widely from the hitherto recognized principles of the American Government? Or are we to have furnished to us another example of the truism which has at one time or another been recognized by all governments, namely, that conditions may arise that make all agreements between governments mere "scraps of paper"?

In 1 9 14, and within three months of the outbreak of hostilities, Japan had succeeded in expelling the Germans from Shantung and had established herself in the province so successfully that by the beginning of 1915 she was ready to move further to extend her control over China. In 1915 she had, by the "twenty-one demands," attained to a quasi-protectorate over China. In 1 916 she had, by secret treaty, secured the adherence of Russia to her Chinese programme. In February-March 191 7 she had, by secret treaties, bound England, France and Italy to the same end, and in November of the same year she had succeeded in committing the United States (as indicated above) in support of her designs.

And yet, with this record of stupendous achievement, almost without a parallel in history, the ambitious and clever statesmen of the Mikado did not rest satisfied. The war was not yet over, and there were still more fruits to be plucked.

THE CESSATION OF HOSTILITIES 15

Accordingly, in 1918, using the situation of the Czechs in Siberia as a pretext, Japan succeeded in enlisting the aid of England, America, France and Italy in an expedition to the mainland for the purpose, as it was alleged, of rescuing the Czechs from the Bolsheviki and the Germans, although the Bolsheviki were at that time entirely unorganized and, if anything, needed protection from the Czechs, and the nearest German troops were five thousand miles away. Of course, Japan had charge of the expedition and furnished the bulk of the troops. The others only gave colour to the undertaking. Because of Japan's paramount interests in the Far East and her geographical proximity, it could not have been otherwise.

To begin with, Japan dispatched 100,000 men to Siberia, which was just ten times as many as she had proposed to send when negotiating with the other Powers. But under the pretext that the Trans-Siberian Railway needed guarding and that her merchants and immigrants in Siberia required protection, Japan justified the sending of so large an army of Japanese troops. To be sure, it requires little political insight to realize that what Japan was really after was Vladivostok and Russia's Maritime Province, together with the expansion of Japanese influence as far west as the Baikal inland sea in South-eastern Siberia. It is, therefore, almost impossible to conceive what could have been the weighty material or moral considerations that induced the statesmen of the Western nations, and particularly President Wilson, to enter upon the folly of this intervention.

With the settling of the Japanese in Eastern Siberia, the last stroke was given to the construction of the imposing edifice of stone upon stone, since the beginning of August 1914, for the purpose of attaining a Japanese hegemony in the Far East. There now remained to give permanency to the structure. It must be made unassailable. And to this end, after hostilities came to a swift close in November 1918, the Japanese directed their best efforts, realizing, however, that the unexpected and to them unwelcome collapse of the Central Powers had created a new and dangerous international situation, in which Japan ran great risk of finding herself utterly isolated, as against the solidarity and overwhelming physical superiority of the Western victors in the World War.

We shall leave the consideration of these new factors in the situation to the following chapter.

Chapter Three Three Factors Op Danger For Japan

For Japan, one of the dangers in the situation that arose after the cessation of hostilities was the question of what recognition the Powers, and particularly the United States, were going to accord China in return for the latter's participation in the war upon the invitation and advice of the Government at Washington.

Second in importance for the Island Empire, as a source of possible obstruction to its plans, was the idealistic programme of President Wilson, embodied in his Fourteen Points and in his efforts to establish a League of Nations.

A third menace for Japan lay in the possibility of an Anglo-Saxon alliance, comprising all the English-speaking nations, in which event England and America would be expected to adopt a common programme with respect to their interests in the Far East.

As regards the first factor in this new situation with which the Government at Tokio saw itself confronted, namely, the attitude of the Powers towards China at the ensuing Peace Conference, Japan had already taken measures to protect herself when, as above pointed out, she secured the promise of England, France and Italy (Russia's consent had also been obtained, but prior to the Revolution) to Support Japan at the Peace Conference in her designs to control Shantung and the German islands north of the Equator. The United States, alone of the Great Powers at war with Germany, had not given its assent to the Japanese programme, and it was just the United States that had taken the leading part in overcoming the opposition of Japan to China's entrance into the war on the side of the Allies.

Twice in 1915 that astute statesman, Yuan Shi Kai, President of the Chinese Republic, had sounded the Allies with respect to the possibility of China declaring war on Germany. Both times she was advised by Great Britain that her participation, however desirable from many standpoints, might result in serious complications elsewhere. Clearly enough, what was meant was that in the event of Japan not having her way in China, her defection from the Allied group was feared, and such a disaster was certainly not to be compensated by the adherence of China.

China had no quarrel with Germany. On the contrary, Germany, because of her almost faultless attitude towards China in the matter of

THREE FACTORS OF DANGER 19

respecting Chinese rights and susceptibilities and the purely commercial character of her occupancy of Shantung (see the writings of Stanley Hornbeck and T. F. Millard), was better liked as a nation than any of the other Great Powers, with the possible exception of the United States.

Accordingly, it was with little enthusiasm that China made the offers above referred to. Her real enemy was Japan, and the problem was how to rescue a large and practically defenceless empire from the clutches of a ruthless and ambitious neighbour who was armed to the teeth. China saw her only hope in joining that one of the warring groups who would be both willing and able to afford her the necessary protection and be just to her in the settlement of her problems at the Peace Conference.

Japan, on the other hand, striving as she was to keep China weak and defenceless, an easy prey to her imperialistic designs, understood China's purpose only too well, and therefore embraced every means to frustrate it; and there is evidence that in 1916 Japan went so far in her opposition as seriously to contemplate a break with her allies and adherence to the cause of the Central Powers. And when the United States finally entered the war, after first breaking off diplomatic relations with Germany in February 191 7, Japan hastened to secure the guarantees she felt she needed from her allies and without which her position in

China would be utterly shaken and insecure. She acted promptly, for she saw clearly what effect the entrance of the United States into the war would have upon the Chinese nation. For the Chinese regard America as entirely without selfish imperialistic aims in China, and therefore as a champion whose friendly sympathies could be relied on to do justice to China when the time came for the settlement of Chinese problems.

Accordingly, the Japanese Minister for Foreign Affairs, when asked for the third time to give his consent to the entrance of China into the war, replied by pulling out a drawer in his desk, in which lay a document which turned out, upon examination, to be the draft of an agreement in which England, France and Italy undertook to support the Japanese claims at the Peace Conference. The bland Japanese diplomat presented the same to the British Ambassador with the remark that he would be most happy to be of service, provided he got his agreement. And he got it. Failing to secure American adhesion to this document, Japanese resourcefulness sought other means to attain the same result, and accordingly the Baron Ishii mission was conceived, to proceed to America and win over "the Yankees." America yielded to pressure because she was enlisted whole-heartedly to go in and bring the European War to a close, and she could not afford to have an enemy on her right flank. Hence