INDIA'S FRONTIER

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 173, 20 January 1912, Page 1 (Supplement)

INDIA'S FRONTIER

THE REAL DANGER: THE APPROACH OF CHINA.

(By Percival Landon, in the Daily Telegraph).

The simple fact that underlies all this new disquiet in the North-East is that within the last six years China has moved down with unexpected swiftness upon the nebulous zone that represents the frontiers of India-in that direction. The danger of tliM approach is threefold. First, it is the expression of a new—and, be it noted, an almost automatic— attempt at expansion on the part of a huge people or set of peoples who have hitherto been complacently regarded by the West as dormant—if not, indeed, dead—and fit only for partition; secondly, the advance is being made, or attempted, in territory over no small part of which China has in the past had more or less visionary rights, chiefly of an indirect and religious nature; and, thirdly, there is for some 600 miles no definite frontier of any kind between India and China. I hope to refer to each of these points, and then to illustrate the situation by suggesting a possibility—a bare possibility, indeed, but, one that is certainly being reckoned with by the restless viceroys of the western and south-western provinces of China. The frontier must be delimited without a moment's delay. The urgency of the danger has now' byfen recognised at Simla. Indeed, the position admits of no alternative reading, though notice has only been drawn to it within the last few months. Eyen as late as six weeks ago the Indian Government had some hopes of carrying through the necessary work without exciting apprehension or even much attention. But that hope is gone. The delimitation of this part of the Indian frontier has passed into one of the international problems of the day, and it is with the hope of strengthening the hands of the Government in dealing adequately with the position that the plain facts of this' .rivalry are here rehearsed. The situar tions is complicated by the almost complete ignorance of the civilised world. No one knows the country through which the frontier line must be drawn, and the . Oriental has a tendency to make a neighbor's ignorance the basis in itself of a claim. Perhaps, however, this is not a characteristic of the East alone. It makes little difference that the Indian Government is actuated solely by a desire to vindicate, by frontier post and geographical definition, a position that has long been ours. The words "defensive" and "offensive" mean little in the policy of Oriental nations. There is, indeed, time to get this work of delimitation done justly and maintained efficiently, but there is only just time. And. in any case, the problems involved, vaguely as they are now guessed at in England, are probably destined to become household words before an end is finally reached. ,

EXPANSION OF CHINA An obvious warning sound should be . given at once. The use of the phrase' "Yellow Peril" in this connection is dangerous and misleading. If the words could be stripped of the romantic haze which so often first enhaloes and then befogs a vague and half-liappy phrase; if it could be associated solely with the automatic and almost necessary expansion of overcrowded China away from the Middle Kingdom, and with the unfortunate fact that, for majiy reasons, North-Eastern India is the point upon'" which this outward pressure has first been felt —then ''Yellow Peril" might stand as a not inconvenient summing-up of the position. But the phrase is tainted with hysteria. The German Emperor's famous, but somewhat theatrical cartoon, by challenging the ridicule of the man of taste—always superficial in world knowledge—has done much to discredit those which before and since have recognised and proclaimed the underlying truth that his Majesty had somewhat over vividly presented. But to-day things are different, and it is to Lord Minto's credit that he should have spoken so strongly on the subject to the Central Asian Society last summer. The population of China has recently been estimated about 320,000,000. It is probably much larger. Imperfect as the late ''census of families" was, it is the best information that is to hand, but the Western average of five persons to a family, which was used to arrive at the total just quoted is misleading, riuch an average would produce gross inaccuracy if applied to many exactly numer- > able races, such as the French Canadians, or the negroes in the Southern States. The Chinese are infinitely more prolific than cither, and even the enormous death rate among infants cannot pull down the average per family to much less than six anrl a-lialf. It'is possible, therefore, that the time-honored estimate of 400,000,000 is not so far from the mark after all. China, especially under the new conditions that have begun to permeate into even the remotest corners of her empire, cannot support this number without hideous drudgery, and the enormous emigration of Chinese to the Malay States and Burma is illustrative of the movement. The attempted suppression of opium smoking will increase this tendency if, as is intended, it shall actually have the result of rousing the Celestial from the drug-be-gotten accidia. For the unprotesting acceptance of a miserable and hopeless lot has never been the characteristic of a race like the Chinese, that produces men of intellect, of character, and, above .all, of strong initiative. Expansion has become inevitable, and two things should be noted which make a combined movement in China much easier than it would be in India—the only other Empire which suggests itself for the purpose of comparison: there is no religious animosity, and there is a more commonly-accepted language, great as the division between north and south has become. FRONTIERS OF INDIA. There ls much virtue in maps, and especially—as Lord Salisbury once pointed out— 7 in large maps, though in ilie present instance no hope of comfort can be held out bv those who study the largest available plans. The whole of the north-eastern frontier districts put together are not as large as Great Britain. The general opinion of the Chinese in the matter of emigration is made clearer by a reference to an atlas. To the north she has the open and effective opposition of Japan; to the north-west and west she is eonfrpnted by the deserts of Central Asia, the western limits of which are guarded by Russia with unmistakable determination. Over Tibet. China is indeed swarming fast; but the habitable parts of the Sacred Kingdom are confined entirely to the river beds of the south, and even these scanty patches dwindle ignoininiously as the frontiers of Kashmir are reached. To the south of Tibet then; are. indeed, Nepan, Sikkhim and Bhutan, well watered, well timbered, and desirable tracts of which I will speak in a motpent. These remain the frontiers of India.

Naturally, Chinese expansion has looked to the south-west. Xot only is there fertility in this direction, but the innaoitants liave semi-Mongoloid blood in their veins, and over all of these trans-frontier States a greater or less amount of suzerainty has been exercised at one time or another by China. But, of them all, the north-eastern frontier of India and Burma tempts them most. The land is rich beyond description. One can stand among the tea gardens, the oil fields and

the coal mines of the Tinsukia district, and feel the eyes of the Mongol fixed upon them from the distant blue hills, where no British writ runs, and whereon a few hundred thousand untamable savages alone act as a buffer between the yellow and the white. Nature riots in Upper Assam and Upper Burma. Tickle the earth, and it responds'as no other soil on earth responds. Huge clogged jungles of valuable timber stretch incessantly over the whole of the precious higher drainage areas that empty themselves into the Bay of Bengal) and the mineral wealth is incalculable also. Man has never been able to resist the temptation to move down-streamj and here is, indeed, a land of promise, a paradise, of which we ourselves have only just realised the value. Moreover, elsewhere there is the exactly-defined frontier to cross; here there stands no angel with fiery sword before the gate, 'because there is on ascertained gate at all. British development gives way to British administration, and that in turn to tribes with whom we have understood relations, and beyond them—what? The steady encroachment of a barbarous, but effective, Chinese occupation, which knows no comity of nations, and will stay its progress only at the very pillar or cairn that stands for our '"Thus far, and no farther." Meanwhile, there Are no pillars or cairns. RELIGIOUS EMPIRE.

To return to the case of the States of Nepal, Sikkim and Bhutan. These Himalayan kingdoms have long since been attached by bonds of different kinds to the Indian Empire, and, as has been said ■before, there is little or no doubt as to their limits in a northern direction. Therefore a great, beoa-use a defined, obstacle has stood, in the way of their recapture by China. To advance beyond their frontiers has meant war, as the Chinese have discovered. And yet China has attempted nothing less than the recapture of those three States. To each of them Pekin, encouraged by her easy conquest of Tibet, has sent letters demanding its return to Chinese allegiance ! At least after this we cannot say we have not had fair warning. ' So far as Sikkim is concerned, the Indian Government's existing relations with the Maharajah were, of course, sufficient to guarantee the State. Nepal may be trusted to look after itself, and, indeed, as the Maharajah-Marshal told me himself, is not unlikely to carry the war into the enemy's camp by a /drastic rearrangement of her northern frontier at the first decent opportunity. Bhutan, however, was in a different category, and we have easily concluded a treaty with the Maharajah—better known to India as the Tongsa Penlop—which guarantees her integrity.

AH these States rendered themselves liable to the approach of China through a tradition of religious subservience. Nepal, indeed, can hardly be said still to be Buddhist, but there remains a large admixture oE Buddhism in the external ritual of the State religion, and the fact remains that an honorary embassy bearing nominal tribute has been sent to Lhassa at fixed periods within very recent years. Sikkim and Bhutan are, of course, purely Buddhist. "The former is united by tne ties of matrimony with leading Lhasa families, and the latter is a conspicuous, though rebellious, daughter of the Lamaic faith. How much attention the Chinese themselves are inclined to pay to Buddhist prejudices we have recently had some evidence, but the excuse of religious dependence has been amply sufficient when the possibility of territorial expansion has been suggested by it. There is an important aspect of this claim. Xot long ago the little town of Rima, upon the south bank of the Lohit river,' was occupied by the Chinese. At first sight, this appeared to be an infringement of British tory, 'as the Lohit itself was at that time vaguely supposed to* be the boundary! in this part of the frontier. The official map 6f India in the Gazetteer illustrates this view. But it was shown that Bima kad been in the habit of paying tribute to and as we make no claim oh Tibetan territory, the Indian Government thought itself obliged to accept the Chinese claim. But in doing this it mistook an act of religious deference for a sign'of political vassalage. At that rate, Bhutan, Sikkim, Nepal and Kashmir itself would have to be surrendered as Tibetan territory. The payment of Peter's Pence from Ireland does not make that island part of the patrimonium Petri. The mere payment of a tribute to the Dalai Lama in previous years is in itself a most unsound argument upon which to base a frontier demarcation. 'However, the claim was allowed, the claims of China, both direct and indirect, having been confined, so far as information can be obtained, to territory which is practically occupied by the Chinese, or by the Tibetans—the old distinction between the two having now no further importance, since the Tibet expedition of 1904, which finally laid the Tibetans once more at the feet of their nearlyrepudiated suzerains.

Now the most cursory glance will show the danger to which I have referred above. There exists a huge wedge of unadministered, and, indeed, practically unknown country between Assam and Burma, and the brpad end of that wedge is overlooked and limited by precisely that part of the province of Yunnan in which there has been the greatest moment, a Chinese force might creep nearly 300 miles into what is unquestionably Indian territory without encountering an outpost, a magistrate, an Englishman, or even any living soul whose duty it would be to report the matter to the Government. This does not mean that we are careless whether the frontier is drawn here or there. But in default of either a frontier or administration it would be difficult to make a causus belli of a Chinese advance into, say, Kaku territory. The present condition of affairs almost invites it. This anomalous position is simply due to the persistent refusal of the Indian Office at Home to allow the Indian Government to administer the upper basins of the Chindwin and the Irrawaddv. Within this huge wedge of territory British prestige and strength is a mere rumor; on the other side is the real vision of Chinese encroachment. This is always a factor to be reckoned with. Terror of China is a living and perpetual menace to these savage tribes. They hear of Celestial brutalities, and slavery is a real and ever-present danger. Here, at least, it still flourishes on British soil. Perhaps all they have ever seen of the English has been a small railway survey party, or a handful of police and coolies escorting a white official through territory in which he is powerless to redress the most glaring wrong. Even if our vitrues be admitted in the abstract, it is of large advantage to China to be regarded as the more brutal of the two great neighboring Empires, lor it is better to placate a vigorous devil 011 the spot than the best-intention-ed of angels, whose hands are perpetually tied from Whitehall.

For some years these mills, which represent one of the biggest industrial enterprises in the "good old town," have been running without any accident worth Press notice happening in them, but last month an explosion occurred which practically wrecked the buildings, and which, with the fire that broke out op the instant, claimed victims by the score. Twenty-two were killed outright by the force of the explosion, and others died as the result of injuries received, the total death roll being 34. In addition, 114 people were injured, some of them so badly that their lives still hang on threads, whilst others have suffered mutilation that will probably erase them from the roll of bread-winners for months to coifle, if not for the term of their natural life.

Bibby's mills are situated in the centre of a densely-built district; in fact, they are hemmed in on all sides by colossal cotton warehouses, huge railway goods depots, and works of various kinds, whilst in the immediate vicinity are narrow courts of houses occupied by the poorest of the poor. The disaster occurred without the slightest warning. At I o'clock the workmen, having had dinner, resumed their duties. A quarter of an hour later there was ;i deafening explosion. The northern portion of the mills shook as if an earthquake had occurred. Some of the main walls fell in, and suddenly a great column of flames leaped out through the roof to a great height. The effect of this seemingly volcanic incident upon those inside the works may be better imagined than described. Men were struck down, some of them never to rise again. Others, in a state of frenzy, many of them with wounds and burns on their heads and bodies, made for such means of exit as lay within their reach. How or why the explosion had "been caused: not one of those who had escaped has 'been able to tell. But whatever the originating influence, the effect was frightful beyond comprehension. The roof was blown off, massive iron doors 12ft high were torn from their fastenings and flung aside twisted and distorted, and brickwork and masonry were flung ruthlessly into the air and came down in a shower in the streets adjacent—several people being injured by the flying debris, and one boy killed on the spot by one of the tonweight iron doors. The fire brigade was' speedily on the spot, but tongues of flame shooting out from many points foi\ a while prevented any near approach to the devastated mill. When at last a way was forced, the scene was appalling. In shattered rooms, dreadfully burned or shockingly mutilated by falling debris, lay dead and injured men. Long after the explosion had taken its full toll of human life, ambulances and taxicabs threaded a way through the vast crowds standing without the entrance to the Northern Hospital, but a stone's throw distant from the scene of the disaster, bearing their freight of disfigured humanity to the wards wherein doctors, hastily summoned, worked with tireless zeal to alleviate the sufferings of the injured, to ease the last hours of the dying. Though no defiinte statement can yet be made as to the cause of the catastrophe, the' generally accepted view is that dust played a very large part in causing the explosion. Experiments have proved that the dust given off by the machinery from the oil cakes when distributed and mixed with ear is highly inflammable; but how great the menace may be depends on atmospheric conditions.