World v. Japan

For ten hours last week the world was like a ball enclosed by an electric bubble. Bubbling away in Switzerland, the superpotent League of Nations wireless station dotted and dashed out 15,000 words on two wave lengths, 20.64 meters for the Western Hemisphere, 38.47 meters for the East. So that even poorly equipped stations could receive, the League slowed down its 130 words-per-minute automatic transmitters to a crawling 25 words-per-minute pace. Soon Washington asked for a speed-up to 75, impatient Shanghai clamored for 100. But Buenos Aires said they could handle not more than 30 words-per-minute and the League refused to flash faster than that. Long before the ten hours were up, the Imperial Japanese Government and they alone had received the whole 15,000 words of bad news by cable from Geneva, paying almost $1 per word.

Normally League messages are flashed at staggering expense over the communication systems of member states. Last week's transmission cost the League only $125, brought to every land and clime the Report on Japan, China and Manchukuo just drafted and unanimously adopted by the League Committee of 19.

This week the League Assembly of 57 states, summoned by its Belgian President Paul Hymans, was to act on the Report in extraordinary session, putting forth what Geneva statesmen called the most powerful and concerted effort to obtain peace ever made.

"Japan's Interests.' Repeatedly by implication but nowhere in so many words does the League Report brand Japan as an aggressor. It recognizes that Chinese "antiforeign propaganda . . . contributed to creating the atmosphere in which the present dispute broke out." It recommends "recognition of Japan's interests in Manchuria," because "the rights and interests of Japan in Manchuria are facts which cannot be ignored." Far from hostile to Japan in tone, the Report is nevertheless firm.

"Without excluding the possibility that on the night of Sept. 18-19, 1931,* the Japanese officers on the spot may have believed that they were acting in self-defense," declares the Report, the League "cannot regard as measures of self-defense . . . the military measures of Japan as a whole. . . .

"It is ... indisputable that, without any declaration of war, a large part of Chinese territory has been forcibly seized and occupied by Japanese troops and that, in consequence of this operation, it has been separated from and declared independent from the rest of China."

The Report deplores China's use of the anti-Japanese boycott up to Sept. 18, 1931, justifies it after that as an act of "reprisal," holds that "no question of Chinese responsibility can arise from the development of events."

Back Where They Belong! Organically the Report consists of four parts: Part One bodily incorporating eight chapters of the League's Lytton Report (TIME, Oct. 10); Part Two rehearsing subsequent developments in 15 phases; and Parts Three & Four which set forth overlapping conclusions & recommendations.

Basic are two conclusions: 1) that Manchuria is a land "which China and foreign powers have always regarded as an integral part of China under Chinese sovereignty"/- 2) that Manchuria has traditionally enjoyed local autonomy, notably when ruled by the late, great War Lord Chang Tso-lin, but "the independence proclaimed by Marshal Chang Tso-lin at different times never meant that either he or the people of Manchuria wished to be separated from China. His armies did not invade China as if it were a foreign country, but merely as participants in the civil war."

Basic also are three recommendations which the Report asks the assembly to adopt: 1) "the Assembly recommends the evacuation of [Japanese] troops" who should withdraw into the only part of Manchuria in which they have treaty rights to be, namely, the narrow South Manchuria Railway Zone running down to Dairen & Port Arthur in Japan's Kwantung Leased Territory; 2) "the Assembly recommends the establishment in Manchuria ... of an organization under the sovereignty ... of China" but with "a wide measure of autonomy ... in harmony with local conditions." This organization should police Manchuria with "an efficient gendarmerie," yet to be created; 3) "the Assembly recommends the opening of negotiations between the two parties" [China & Japan] and invites each to accept the Assembly's recommendations in toto "subject to the sole condition that the other party also accepts them."

Most important of all is this final, negative proviso: "It follows that, in adopting this report, the members of. the League intend to abstain, particularly as regards the existing regime in Manchuria [i. e. the "Government of Manchukuo"] from any act which might prejudice or delay the carrying out of the recommendations of the said report. They will continue not to recognize this regime, either de jure or de facto."

Japan's Retort. In Tokyo, after the usual consultation with Prince Saionji, "Last of the Genro" or Elder Statesman of Japan, Premier Admiral Viscount Makoto Saito & Cabinet adroitly decided last week, according to their Press spokesman, "to put the whole matter up to the Assembly." They advised the Privy Council and Emperor Hirohito that if the Assembly adopted the Report then Japan must refuse to accept it and withdraw from the League. For good measure the War Office spokesman said that Japan would intensify her offensive to take Jehol about the time the Assembly is expected to vote on the Report. Japan planned also to withdraw from the Geneva Disarmament Conference's "hostile atmosphere." Minister of the Navy Mineo Osumi said, "While we shall not challenge others, we shall accept the challenge of others."

Under the League Covenant neither Japan nor China is obliged to announce acceptance or rejection of the Report until 90 days after its adoption by the Assembly. Japan would remain a League member for two years after serving notice of intention to quit the League. Moreover the U. S. and Soviet Russia are to be asked under a paragraph of the Report (if adopted) to "associate themselves with the views expressed in the report . . . and concert their action and their attitude with the members of the League."

In Washington last week Statesman Stimson, though flattered by the Report's adoption of his "Stimson Doctrine" (nonrecognition & noncooperation with respect to Manchukuo), gave correspondents to understand that the League must apply to Franklin Delano Roosevelt (presumably after March 4) for any assurance that the U. S. Government will associate itself or cooperate with the League Assembly. Prospects therefore are for slow rather than swift action in attempting to make Japan mind the League. Mum as an oyster about cooperating last week was the Government of the Union of Socialist Soviet Republics, the largest nation in the world and the only one which adjoins China, Manchukuo and Japan.

*When Chinese soldiers allegedly attacked Japanese railway guards in the South Manchuria Railway Zone.

/-Britons unearthed from the dusty archives of their Foreign Office last week a copy of a Japanese note to Russia in 1904 protesting the "repeated refusal of the Imperial Russian Government to accept the obligation to respect the territorial integrity of China in Manchuria. . . menaced by prolonged occupation of that province by Russia."

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