Progress & Prospect

Progress and Prospect

"The national policy calls for a successful settlement of the China Incident."

The voice that crackled this new threat to China over the Tokyo radio was new Japanese Premier General Eiki Tojo's. The voice did not frighten Chungking.

War in Progress. Chiang Kai-shek's 300-odd divisions--3,000,000 soldiers facing Japan's estimated 800,000 (30 or more divisions) on the 2,000-mile China front --believed that the Japanese could do no more against them than they had been doing. Only if Japan chose to throw in another 20 or 30 divisions was there more than a remote possibility of Chinese defeat. And those divisions seemed earmarked for another purpose: the invasion of eastern Siberia.

China had just passed through six of the most active weeks since the fall of Hankow in 1938. The Japanese had withdrawn troops from Ichang, lunged at Chinese-held Changsha and seized it, only to be driven out. The Chinese, in turn, had smashed at Japanese-held Ichang and held that city for three days; then they, too, had been driven out. The two campaigns balanced. They proved that the Japanese could not withdraw troops from extended outposts without jeopardizing them, could hold no new positions without reinforcements. They proved that without artillery the Chinese had no hope of putting on a real offensive.

War in Prospect. What bothered the Chinese most was not General Tojo's war in progress. It was his war in prospect. For years the Chinese Government had feared both Russia and Japan, had dreamed of a war that might drain strength from both. Last week the dream seemed about to come true, but it seemed a nightmare.

To be sure, if Russia and Japan fought, the Chinese would still reap immediate advantages. There would be a relaxation of pressure all along the front. Japan might withdraw enough troops to forfeit many secondary outposts to the Chinese. Chinese Communists no doubt would be slower to quarrel with the Central Government, more active against Japan.

But China's gains would probably be limited. China's offensive strength is almost zero. Only if a Russo-Japanese war were long drawn out, only if the U.S. equipped China with artillery and planes, would Chinese numbers revive Russia's failing strength.

Russia had been a good friend to China in the past few years; Russian arms had helped to keep China fighting. Chinese realized last week that their own security depended on the resistance of Russian soldiers on the bloodstained field of Mos cow as well as in the windswept valley of Siberia's Amur River. If Germany "and Japan won, between them they might force any peace they wished on China.

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