The Gisborne Times PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. MONDAY, DECEMBER 30, 1907.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 2075, 30 December 1907, Page 2

The Gisborne Times PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. MONDAY, DECEMBER 30, 1907.

THE AVAR OF THE RACES. The irony of fate has been displayed in many remarkable ways during modern history, but it will not be surprising to the more thoughtful students of the world’s affairs if the present craze for enormous armaments docs not provide Quito as unexpected a sequel as any policy that has preceded it. It is scarcely concealed amongst either Germans or Englishmen that the feverish liast-e of the former to create a mighty navy is due entirely to the possibility of a conflict with England, yet it will not be surprising if the powerful fleet of the Kaiser that' is now in process of building is found when completed fighting side by side with the Dreadnoughts of Britain in a mighty struggle for the supremacy of the white race. Scarcely a day passes but we have some news of the extraordinary steps that are being taken iby tlie great Powers to strengthen their fleets. In each case mutual jealousy appears to he the only motive, and there seems no disposition to regard the Orientals as a serious factor in the situation. Russia, it is true, for geographical, not racial, reasons, lias no out iun but to accept the position \<jf being chiefly hostile to the Japan--cso, but Britain is so far from recognising any conflict of interests with the Asiatic peoples as to be actively allied with the Mikado’s subjects. The United States alone of the white Powers appears to be really giving the Asiatic movement the attention it deserves, and there is little doubt that President Roosevelt has been inspired to advocate a much more extensive navy building programme than heretofore by the increased- activity of the Japanese. This in fact can be tlie only answer to Uncle Sam’s new naval policy. America’s' relations with European Powers have never been more secure, and with the •Monroe doctrine generally accepted there seems not the slightest excuse for increasing war expenditure so far as ordinary contingencies are concerned. But the American President, ns well as the American people, must have been profoundly impressed by tlie attitude of a section of tlie Japanese press as displayed over the San Francisco riots. It is true this jingoistic display was promptly repudiated by the responsible advisor of the Mikado, who vowed eternal friendship for tlie Americans, but the Fact that a war with America would be exceedingly inopportune for -Japan just io,>will not blind the Americans to the significance of the demonstrations which took place in Tokio. Undoubtedly what was -first described ns ‘‘the yellow peril,” but which can now be better described as “the Asiatic peril,” grows more serious each day. Amongst the sensational details of “The Drucc. Case,” “The Atoutc Carlo Tragedy,” “The Thaw -Case,” and such topics, more prosaic matters of immense importance are apt to be overlooked, but, all the -same, the premonitions of the coming struggle between East and West are becoming much more frequent, and few days pass now without the receipt of some cable message indicating tlie prospects of trouble abend, in today’s issue, for instance, we find the London Times giving its views oil the. wholo question of Asiatic -immigration, whilst another aspect of the same situation is disclosed in the report of a meeting of Indians in the Transvaal. Whether it is ibe economic aspect which causes the white laborers of Australasia, Canada, South Africa,- and the United States t.s object to the immigration til Asiatics, with the consequent lowering of wages, or whether it be the cause of racial purity, the main fact remrins tho satno, that throughout the woilil to-day this problem is daily manifesting itself in one form or another. In New Zealand we are attempting to make some very stringent restrictions against the entry of Ihe Chinese, and .it the present time they are not impossible of enforcement; in fact, the Chinaman lias, nowadays, to submit to a good deal in the way of indignity from foreign nations. Yet it will not always be thus. China is at present organising an army that, according to European experts, will in a few years constitute an efficient force of several hundred thousand men, and these 11111111)01-8 will he capable of almost indefinite expansion. The position of Japan as a worldpower lias already been proved, and if the reorganised Chinese nation and the Japs were to make common cause against the white races they would

make , a heap of trouble. In India the dusky subjects of the King aro becoming more aggrossivo each year in their claim for independence, whilst tho Moroccan rising is looked upon by many us merely a small blit significant manifestation of a projected rising by •Moslems in all parts of the world. Great as have been Britain’s difficulties in South Africa in tlie past, it is generally recognised that tho real problem in that country is of ihe future, when the millions of natives will decide to claim possession of the country they occupy. In ml these toffies there is certainly food for serious reflection, if not for alarm, and it is by 110 means inconceivable that tho present century may see a gigantic struggle, in which the white peoples will be forced to contest with the dark-skinned races for supremacy in the world’s affairs.