After Four Years

Abstract

IT is by now generally accepted that successive waves of Japanese aggression China, beginning Manchuria i93i and leading up to the invasion of I937, contributed powerfully to the outbreak of war Europe ig3g. Failure to deal with the earlier phases of this aggression provided precedents for the Italian conquest of Abyssinia, the Fascist invasion of Spain, and the settlement at Munich where Czechoslovakia, without even being allowed to be represented, was signed over to Hitler by the representatives of countries which called themselves democracies. During these years the principles of collective security were one by one destroyed. Worse than that, the morale of democracy as an institution of responsible self-government was undermined: for every successive compromise with aggression carried the ominous inference that in certain cases it was better to come to terms with open, vainglorious, institutionalized inequality than to maintain sentimental or idealistic principles of equality. Then came 1939. Germany, followed by Italy, turned at last against the big countries which had considered the liberties of small or weak countries a too expensive luxury. This, however, did not relieve the small and weak countries from pressure. Far from it. They became involved the increasing fury of the struggle between the great powers. In this confused and now world-wide war the position of China is unique. It was the first country to move from partial and local resistance Manchuria I93i, at Shanghai I932, Jehol 1933, and Suiyuan i936 to a resistance of the whole people I937. It began a struggle of incalculable magnitude without even the benefit of full sovereignty. China, confronting the Japanese attack, did not have full control of its own revenues; for foreigners, including Japanese, held the key positions the Maritime Customs. At the vital seaports foreigners, including Japanese, lived and