FAR EAST CONFLICT

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 July 1939, Page 5

FAR EAST CONFLICT

TACTICS OF THE CHINESE

GUERILLA WARFARE.

WILL JAPANESE ECONOMY STAND STRAIN?

Japanese hostilities in China have entered upon a new phase, states Walter W. Mallory, American Executive of Foreign Relations. After the fall of Hankow, General Chiang Kai-shek moved his capital to Chunking, 1400 miles inland from the coast. Though it was then supposed that the Japanese would be content to consolidate their conquests, General Hata soon announced that Japanese troops would pursue Chiang Kai-shek to the furthest frontiers of China.

Positional battle with large bodies of troops have given way to a campaign of provocative raids, ambushes and rapid retreats, which is the traditional method of Chinese guerilla warfare; but on a much larger scale than has been known.

The conflict has put a severe strain on Japanese economy. In 1931, before her attack on Manchuria had developed, the national debt stood at 4,500,000, • 000 yen, by 1'937 it had increased to 9,500'000.000, and it has now passed 20,000 000,000. China is not industrialised like Japan so her purchases have been mostly fin • ished products, munitions, and air planes. China has paid for these supplies by exports, barter agreements such as those arranged with Germany, foreign credits, which she seems to have been able to arrange, especially 7 with Russia, and silver shipments. It is known that she has sent abroad over 1,000,000,000 Chinese dollars. JAPANESE FORCES. Japan has about 1,000,000 men on the mainland of Asia. A part of these are in Manchuria, but the bulk of them are scattered along the 6000 miles of Chinese railways and 700 miles up to the Yangtse River. As long as Chinese resistance continues in any force, Japan will need to keep the shorter portion of these troops there. Her lines of communication are so extended that even with an army of 500,000 men it wbuld be difficult to concentrate large forces in any one place. After occupying North China for over a year, Japan controls only a narrow strip along the railway lines. The area between contains a teeming Chinese population of tens of millions living on the land and self-contained. Most of these people have never seen a Japanese uniform. From these reservoirs of man-power and supplies, guerilla forces are organised which attack the Japanese garrisons, cut the railway lines, and then swiftly retreat. The Japanese method of retaliation is to make incursions into the interior, destroy the villages from which the attack seemed to emanate, and then return to their bases. This is a costly process and it seems possible for Japan to bring order in this vast territory only through the co-opera-tion of the Chinese. It is the hope of the Chinese that Japan’s economy will crack under the strain of keeping so huge a force in the field. Thus far, the Japanese morale seems unshaken.

POSITIONAL WARFARE CEASES. Now that positional warfare has ceased, the 'Chinese need is hot for heavy equipment, but for rifles, small arms ammunition, and explosives. Chiang Kai shek has moved his arsen als into the far West, although it is doubtful whether they are able to produce anything but small arms and am - munition, and perhaps a few trench mortars. For guerilla warfare, however, this is all that is required. On the financial side, the Chinese have been weakened by the loss of revenue from the maritime customs and from other taxes in much of the area which Japan nominally controls. Chiang will need to depend now on the revenues in the provinces which he still controls, on whatever foreign balances he has been able to husband, and on foreign credits which he seems able to secure. For the most part his armies will be able to live off the country, as has long been the practice of China’s provincia , troops. But it seems clear that the chances of his driving the Japanese out of the country by frontal attack has been lost. Chiang’s only possible offensive weapon now is his air force. Planes can be flown in, and if he could -ecure them in sufficient numbers, he might be able to start an offensive. Japan has the greater power toda;| but if China continues to resist, that power will decrease. Japan is an in dustrialised country and must maintain large imports of raw materials which are essential to keep the wheels turning. China is nearly self-contained, and has immense man-power. NEVER CONQUERED. There is much in China’s past to refute the theory that she can be conquered by the Japanese. To win a war of conquest it is necessary for the con ■ querors to establish a reign of order, without which it is impossible for them to garner the fruits of their success China has not been an orderly coun try for a long time even under Chinese management. The Japanese, of course, hope to do belter, bringing the country into some semblance of co -opera tion. The Chinese have lived in thTerritory which wo call China for thousands of years, and throughout al 1 that period they have kept inviolat' their cultural solidarity. They have or' occasion been overrun by barbarian who came down from the north. Thehave never been conquered. Thoswho have sought to rule them haw been absorbed.

The Japanese remember China’s pa*' record. Thus even the most optimistic among them never speak of absorbing the Chinese. They know that it would not be a case of the 70.000.000 Japanese absorbing 400 000 000 Chinese, fo" +h Japanese are in Japan—not China. An they have no intention of migrating 1' that country. It would, therefore, be ? case of 500.000 or say even 1.000 00 p armed men seeking to absorb 400 000 000 people who consider their own cul ture greater, their history more admirable. and their way of life more satisfactory than anything the Japan'’*' - have to offer. They are not unmindb’ 1 of the fact that whatever there is abou’ the Japanese which entitles them to b<~ regarded as civilised men, this they have taken from China in past ages—even including their written language. HELP FROM RUSSIA. It is true, of course, that Russia i* on China’s side. She has given considerable help to the Chinese by furnishing airplanes, supplies, and presumably credits. The Japanese have long con sidered Russia as a potential threat. One of the declared purposes of Japanese invasion of North China was to