Anti-Pro-Comintern

One of the oddest diplomatic rituals in the world is the annual negotiation for fishery lease agreements between Japan and Soviet Russia. The talks begin in November. Everyone knows how they are going to come out--as they always have, with a compromise which two fishermen could reach in an hour's talk. But for as much as six months, representatives of the two countries bow deeply, sip tea, shake heads, pound tables, grin, frown, embrace, clench fists--throughout standing thunderously firm on impossible demands. Then, the day the first silvery smolts begin to run in the bitter waters off Sakhalin Island, the diplomats find themselves in sudden agreement, and sign.

But last week, when the annual talks began, there was a new, serious air about them. For one thing, Russia's new Ambassador to Tokyo Constantin Smetanin knew what he was talking about. He used to be a professor of ichthyology. Furthermore, Ambassador Smetanin was appointed to his post the day Japan agreed to a truce in the Outer Mongolian border fighting--after Russia had trounced the seatful pants off the Japanese Army. He was in a position to dictate.

Foreign Minister Admiral Kichisaburo Nomura began to think of a "permanent arrangement." Foreign Office Spokesman Yakichiro Suma called correspondents in to tell them: "We are anxious to settle pending questions and we hope that Russia reciprocates our desire in all sincerity." Domei News Agency, which plays Little Sir Echo to the Foreign Office, advocated concluding a non-aggression treaty with Russia "without paying the slightest attention to displeasure felt and loudly voiced by Britain and the U. S." This week Ambassador Smetanin had an audience with the Son of Heaven, H. I. M. Hirohito.

And in Moscow it was officially announced that Japanese Ambassador Shigenori Togo and Foreign Commissar Viacheslav M. Molotov had found a "community of views ... on the fundamental principles upon which a Soviet-Japanese trade agreement must be based." In recent Russian diplomacy, non-aggression pacts have followed trade agreements as faithfully as the little lamb trailed Mary.

Finis? To poor China, all this was gloomy news. For every step which brings Russia and Japan closer together hasten-China's fall. Soon and late, Russia has been China's best friend--more constant and generous than Britain, the U. S. or France. But no one knows better than the Chungking Government that the Russian bear has learned how to somersault.

From Peking (Japanese) and Hong Kong (neutral) came reports that last month Communist Generalissimo Mao Tse-tung charged the central authorities with failing to set up democratic government in China, with having arrested a Communist officer without provocation, with having actually fought a three-day battle against the Communists when the Japanese were less than 100 miles away.

A short-wave broadcast from Tokyo last week reported new conflict: Some fighting in Kansu Province, Communist demands for more Central Government funds, a conference of Communist leaders at Yenan headed by the second-in-command, Chu Teh, to discuss the contingency of open warfare with Chungking.

Certain it is that for some time the famed Eighth Route Army has been an uneasy fieldfellow with the Central Armies. Communists scorn the elegant-mannered, fancy-uniformed officers of Whampoa Military Academy (founded by Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek); the Government resents the exaggerated publicity the simple-living, peasant-loving, estate-looting Communist guerrillas have had. Government soldiers get $7.50 to $9 (Chinese) per month; Communist soldiers get $1. The Government charges that the Communists promised to limit their Army to some 45,000 men, but have recruited over 100,000. Communists charge that the Government promised a monthly subsidy of $45,000, has been granting only $30,000. Central Armies have uniform arms; Communists have eight different kinds of rifles, and the Government has given them no artillery, no telephone wire, no heavy machine guns, almost no ammunition. The Government says: Why train and arm a Communist Army just to have it turn on us? Generalissimo Chiang has long been a hater of Communists; nor do the Communist leaders, Mao, Chu and Chou Enlai, on all of whose heads he once set a price, trust him. This week, in a peculiarly Chinese maneuver, the Kuomintang's Central Executive Committee summoned Generalissimo Chiang as President of the Executive Yuan (Premier) again, reducing Premier H. H. Kung to vice president. Then it issued a four-point manifesto, the most emphatic point of which was a refusal to join any anti-Comintern agreement.

The aims of Joseph Stalin are inscrutable, his route of procedure dark as the labyrinth. Most observers have thought that his Eastern interests could best be served by keeping Japan in a more or less permanent death-clinch with China. But on Russia's West a policy of friendship has lately done great things for Joseph Stalin's ego, area, attitude; and he may well have decided to train grins rather than guns on Japan as well. If he has, the last words of the last chapter of the story of free China were last week being written.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.