OUTLOOK IN CHINA

Wairarapa Times-Age, 9 January 1940, Page 4

OUTLOOK IN CHINA

DEPENDENT ON EUROPEAN WAR EMPIRE RALLY IMPRESSES EASTERN PEOPLES. BRITISH PRESTIGE RAISED. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) AUCKLAND, January 8. ‘•Paradoxically, the ultimate outcome of events in China and the rest of the Far East depends on the European war.” said Mr Ivan Palmer, a former Auckland journalist, who returned by the Mariposa today on a brief visit after four years’ adventures in the Far East. He said that in French Indo-China and the Philippines on the way from Singapore to Auckland he found the native peoples reading news of the developments in Europe more avidly than news of the Sino-Japanese war, which is on their very doorstep. “Britain’s stand against aggression has done a tremendous lot for British prestige in the East,” said Mr Palmer. “What has impressed the Asiatic peoples particularly is the splendid way all countries in the Empire have rallied to Britain’s cause.” Mr Palmer said that it was no secret that there were thousands of trained soldiers in the Far East ready to do their part for the British Empire should the Pacific become a theatre of war.