THE GOAL OF THE REDS

Hokitika Guardian, 4 January 1927, Page 4

THE GOAL OF THE REDS

(By SIR PER Cl VAL PHILLIPS, the Special Correspondent of tiie London " Daily Mail,” who recently investigated the Bolshevik Movement in China.)

Shanghai is a prize upon which the Russian Bolsheviks have long cast envious eyes. It is the goal of their antiBritish movement winch began at Canton with the boycott ol Ilong-kong. The sweep northward of the Red armies under Russian influence was the second step in the conspiracy to break Great Britain's trade and prestige. Once Urnily established there, tbc invasion of the Yang-tsu valley will follow, with Shanghai as its final objective. There is no other city like it in all Asia. The old-fashioned, easy-going community of twenty years ago, with its homely hotels and indifferent streets, has gone. Five years of rebuilding on war profits transformed Shanghai into a fast-living, hard-work-ing. and pleasure-loving city which is like a combination of London, Paris, and New York. Jt is difficult to realise that this wholly European city, with its department stores, telephones, broadcasting stations and cabarets, is separated by only the width of a country road from the filth and disorder of the East.

European Shanghai is a miniature Republic. it is governed ill greater part by the Consular Body. Passports do not run. You come and go as you like. The result is that, in addition to being g pleasant resort and an important centre of trade. Shanghai is a refuse heap for beachcombers of the Orient.

The population is strongely mixed. Of the dO,OOO inhabitants, 20,000 are European and the rest Japanese. There are 7,000 British, fewer than 4,000 Americans, perhaps a thousand each of French and Germans. 2,000 other nationals excluding Russians, and more than 5.000 Russians, the majority refugees from Siberia since Russia went Red.

These refugees are to be found everywhere, in all kinds of jobs. Others do not work at tho Soviet Consulate-Gen-eral, which secretly recruits ex-soldiers for the Rod levies up country. Certain cabarets ipf which there are perhaps a dozen of all grades ol respectability) arc staffed entirely by Russian women. This polyglot community is kept in order by as curiously mixed a police force, its 2.500 constables include British, Sikhs, Italians and Chinese. Tn the French Settlement French law prevails, and French native constables from Aiinam patrol the streets.

Shanghai has its own standing army, a defence force 1.000 strong, equipped with Enfield rifles, Springfield automatic pistols, armoured cars and tin hats. Although’small in numbers they are surprisingly efficient, as Chinese rioters have good reason to know. British, ex-airmen possess a club of their own, composed of pilots, observers, mechanics and engineers, who served in the war. who keep in touch with flic developments in aviation in the Ear East. There is also the Shanghai Club, one of tlie finest in the East, and an. English Country Club. Beyond everything Shanghai is giiy. One of its cabaret-dance halls is larger and finer than anything in London or Xew York. Xight club flourish from mid-night until dawn, with no one to say nay. Champagne is almost as cheap as imported English beer, and the finest cigars in the world cost less than in London. There are four large Chinese hotels run on European lines. They are always filled with rich guests, who give parties exactly as in England. Three other modern hotels cater for Europeans. Shanghai is not only the most important commercial centre north of llong-kong; it also is the playground of the Ear East. The people who live and work there have to make ttieir own amusements, and they succeed admirably.