Glimpses of World History

by Jawaharlal Nehru

  Japan is an extraordinary example of a mixture of modern industrialism and medieval feudalism, of parliamentarism and autocracy and military control. The ruling landowning and military classes have deliberately tried to build up a State on the lines of a clan, with themselves as the chiefs and the Emperor as the supremo head. Religion, education, everything has been made to help in this process. Religion is an officially controlled affair, the temples and shrines being directly under official control, and the priests holding official posts. Thus a huge propaganda machine, working through the temples and schools, is constantly teaching the people, not only patriotism to the country, but obedience to the will of the Emperor who is to be considered semi-divine. The old Japanese term for something corresponding to the old chivalry was “Bushido”, a kind of clan loyalty. This idea has been extended to cover the whole State, and with it is connected the Emperor at the top. The Emperor is really a symbol in whose name the ruling big landlord and military classes exercise power. Industrialization has developed a bourgeoisie in Japan, but the big industrial magnates happen to come from the old landowning families, and thus there has so far been no transfer of power to the bourgeoisie as such. In effect, there is so much monopoly in Japan that a few powerful families control the industry as well as the politics of the country.

  Buddhism has long been a popular faith in Japan, but Shinto is more of a national religion, with its stress on ancestor-worship. This worship includes the past emperors and heroes of the nation, and especially those who have died in war. In this way it becomes a powerful and effective method for spreading a love of country and the idea of obedience to the reigning emperor. The Japanese people are famous for their amazing patriotism and their capacity for sacrifice for their country. It is not so well known that this patriotism is of a very aggressive kind, and dreams of world empire. About 1915 a new sect was started in Japan. It was called the “Omoto-Kyo” sect, and it spread very rapidly all over the country. The principal doctrine of this sect was that Japan should become the ruler of the whole world, the Emperor being the supreme head. On behalf of the sect it was stated: “We are only aiming at making the Emperor of Japan ruler and governor of the whole world, as he is the only ruler in the world who retains the spiritual mission inherited from the remotest ancestor in the divine world.”

  During the World War, as we have seen, Japan tried to bully China by her twenty-one demands. She did not get all she wanted, because of the outcry in America and Europe, but she got a great deal. After the war Japan saw in the collapse of the Tsarist Empire an ideal opportunity for spreading out in Asia. Her armies entered Siberia and her agents came right up to Samarqand and Bokhara in Central Asia. That adventure failed because of the recovery of Soviet Russia and to some extent the opposition and distrust of America. For it must always be remembered that there is little love lost between Japan and the United States of America. They dislike each other greatly, and glare at each other across the Pacific Ocean. The Washington Conference of 1922 was a blow to Japanese ambitions and a victory for American diplomacy. At this conference nine Powers, including Japan, pledged themselves to respect the integrity of China, which meant that Japan must give up all hopes of spreading out in China. At this Conference also the Anglo-Japanese alliance came to an end and Japan stood isolated in the Far East. The British Government started building a mighty naval base at Singapore, and this was obviously a threat to Japan. In 1924 the United States of America passed an anti-Japanese immigration Bill, as they wanted to keep out Japanese workers from the States. This racial discrimination was greatly resented in Japan, and to some extent all over the East. But Japan could do nothing against America. Feeling isolated and surrounded by a hostile ring, Japan turned to Russia, and in January 1925 signed a treaty with her.

  I must tell you of a great disaster that befell Japan during this period and which weakened her very much. This was a terrible earthquake which took place on September 1,1925, and was followed by a tidal wave and a fire in the great capital city of Tokyo. This huge city was destroyed and so also the port of Yokohama. Over 100,000 people died and enormous damage was done. The Japanese people met the disaster with courage and resolution and built a new city of Tokyo on the ruins of the old.

  Japan had come to terms with Russia because of her difficulties, but this did not mean approval of communism. Communism meant the end of emperor-worship, and feudalism, and the exploitation of the masses by the ruling class, and indeed almost everything that the existing order stood for. This communism was growing in Japan because of the increasing misery of the people, who were being exploited more and more by powerful industrial interests. The population was growing rapidly. It could not emigrate to America or Canada or even the barren wastes of Australia; the doors were closed. China was near, but China was over full of people. There was some emigration to Korea and Manchuria. Besides her own especial troubles, Japan had to face the common troubles of industrialism and trade depression which all the world was experiencing. As the internal situation grew more serious, severe repression of communist and all radical ideas began. In 1925 a “Peace Preservation Law” was passed and, as the wording is interesting, I shall give you the first article of this law. It runs thus:

  That those who have organized an association or fraternity with the object of altering the national constitution, or of repudiating the private property system, or those who have joined such an organization with full knowledge of its object, are to be punished with penalties, ranging from death to servitude of over five years.

  The extreme severity of this law, which bars not only communism but all forms of socialistic or radical or constitutional reform, is a measure of the fright of the Japanese Government at the rise of communism.

  But communism is the outcome of widespread misery due to social conditions, and unless these conditions are improved, mere repression can be no remedy. There is a terrible misery in Japan at present. The peasantry, as in China and India, are crushed under a tremendous burden of debt. Taxation, especially because of heavy military expenditure and war needs, is very heavy. Reports come of starving peasants trying to live on grass and roots, and of selling even their children. The middle classes are also in a bad way owing to unemployment, and suicides have increased.

  The campaign against communism began on a big scale early in 1928, when over 1000 arrests were made in the course of one night, and yet newspapers were not allowed to publish this fact for over a month. Police raids and mass arrests have taken place frequently year after year. One of the biggest raids took place in October 1932, when 2250 persons were arrested. Most of these people were not labourers, but students and teachers. There were among them hundreds of graduates and women. It is curious to notice that many rich young people have been attracted to communism in Japan. Advanced thinkers there, as in India and elsewhere, are considered more dangerous than criminals. Like the Meerut trial in India, some of the Japanese communist trials have gone on for years.

  I have told you all this about conditions in Japan so that you may have some idea of the background of the Manchurian adventure of Japan, about which I propose to tell you something now.

  You have read in previous letters of Japan’s persistent attempts to get a footing on the Asiatic mainland, first in Korea and then in Manchuria. The war with China of 1894 and the Russian war of ten years later were both waged with this object in view. Success came to Japan and step by step she went ahead. Korea was absorbed and became just a part of the Japanese Empire. In Manchuria, which is a general name for China’s three eastern provinces, the Russian lease and concessions round about Port Arthur were transferred to Japan. Part of the railway built by Russia across Manchuria, the Chinese Eastern Railway, also came under Japanese control, and was named the South Manchuria Railway. In spite of all these changes Manchuria as a whole still continued to be under the Chinese Government, and because of the railway Chinese immigrants poured in. Indeed, this immigration to the three northeastern provinces is supposed to be one of t
he greatest migrations in world history. Within seven years, from 1923 to 1929, over 2,500,000 Chinese went across. The population of Manchuria is about 30,000,000 now, and of these 95 per cent are Chinese. The three provinces are thus thoroughly Chinese. The remaining 5 per cent are Russians, Mongol nomads, Koreans, and Japanese. The old Manchus have become absorbed in the Chinese, and have even forgotten their language.

  You will remember my telling you of the Nine-Power Treaty signed at the Washington Conference of 1922. This was specially made, at the suggestion of the Western Powers, to check Japanese designs in China. Explicitly and unambiguously, all the nine Powers (of which Japan was one) agreed “to respect the sovereignty, the independence and the territorial and administrative integrity of China”.

  For some years Japan held her hand. Behind the scenes, however, she helped, with money and otherwise, some of the Chinese war-lords, or tuchuns, to carry on the civil war and thus weaken China. In particular, she helped Chang Tso Lin, who dominated Manchuria and even Peking till the victory of the southern nationalists. In 1931 the Japanese Government adopted an openly aggressive attitude in Manchuria. This may have been due to their intense economic crisis, which forced them to do something abroad in order to divert attention as well as relieve the tension at home, or to the dominance of the military party in the Government, or to the feeling that all the other Powers were busy with their own troubles and the trade depression and were not likely to interfere. Probably all these reasons worked together to induce the Japanese Government to take a step which was a very serious one. For this step was a distinct breach of the Nine-Power Treaty of 1922. It was also a breach of the League of Nations Covenant, for both China and Japan were members of the League, and, as such, could not attack each other without reference to the League. And, lastly, it was a clear breach of the Paris (or Kellogg) Pact of 1928 for the outlawry of war. By carrying on warlike operations against China, the Japanese Government deliberately broke these treaties and pledges and defied the world.

  Japan’s War on China

  Of course they did not say so. They put up some feeble, and obviously untrue, excuse of bandits in Manchuria and some petty incidents which compelled them to send their troops to maintain order and protect their interests. There was no open declaration of war, but nevertheless there was a Japanese invasion of Manchuria. The Chinese people were very angry at this. The Chinese Government protested and appealed to the League of Nations and the other Powers, but no one paid any attention to them. Each country was full of its own troubles and unwilling to add to them by opposing Japan. It is also probable that some Powers, and notably England, had a secret arrangement with Japan. Chinese irregular troops gave a lot of trouble to the Japanese in Manchuria. And yet there was supposed to be no war between the two countries! More troublesome to Japan was a great movement in China for the boycott of Japanese goods.

  In January 1932 a Japanese army suddenly descended on Chinese soil near Shanghai, and perpetrated one of the most ghastly massacres of modern times. They avoided the foreign concession areas, so as not to irritate the western Powers, and attacked the densely populated Chinese quarters. A huge area near Shanghai (I think its name was Chapei) was bombed and shelled and utterly destroyed, thousands being killed and vast numbers rendered homeless. Remember that this was not a fight against an army. It was the bombing of innocent civilians. The Japanese admiral who was in charge of this gallant operation, when asked about it, stated that Japan had mercifully decided that there should be “only two more days of indiscriminate bombing of civilians”! Even the pro-Japanese correspondent of the London Times in Shanghai was shocked by this “wholesale massacre”, as he called it, of the Chinese by the Japanese. What the Chinese people felt about it may well be imagined. A wave of horror and anger passed through China, and the various war-lords and governments in the country forgot, or seemed to forget, their mutual rivalries before this barbarous foreign invasion. There was talk of a united front against Japan, and even the communist Government of the Chinese interior offered its services to the Nanking Government. And yet, strange to say, Nanking, or its leader Chiang Kai-Shek, made no move to defend Shanghai from the advancing Japanese troops. All that Nanking did was to protest to the League. It did not even try to build up a united resistance against the Japanese. It almost appears that it had no desire to resist, in spite of its tall talk and the burning indignation of the country.

  And then there appeared at Shanghai an odd army from the south— the Nineteenth Route Army it was called. It consisted of Cantonese people, but it was not under the orders of either the Nanking or the Canton Government. It was a ragged army with little equipment, no big guns, poor uniforms, and not enough clothing to protect it from the bitter cold of a Chinese winter. There were many boys of fourteen and sixteen serving in it; some were only twelve years old. This ragged army decided to fight and hold the Japanese in defiance of Chiang Kai-Shek’s orders. For two weeks in January and February 1932 they fought without any help from the Nanking Government, and they fought with such remarkable heroism that the far stronger and better-equipped Japanese were, much to their surprise, held up. Not only the Japanese but everybody was surprised, the foreign Powers and the Chinese people themselves. After two weeks’ unaided fighting, when everybody was full of praises of this army, Chiang Kai-Shek sent some of his troops to help in the defence.

  The 19th Route Army made history and became famous the world over. Their defence upset Japanese plans, and as the Western Powers were also anxious about their interests in Shanghai, the Japanese troops were gradually withdrawn from the Shanghai area and shipped away. It is worth noting that these Western Powers were far more concerned with their financial or other interests than with odd massacres like the Chapei one, in which thousands of Chinese had been killed, or with the breach of solemn treaties and international covenants. The League of Nations was repeatedly moved in the matter, but always it found some excuse for postponing action. The fact that an actual war was going on and thousands had been and were being killed was not a matter of urgency for the League. It was said that there was no real war because it had not been officially declared to be a war! The reputation and prestige of the League suffered greatly by this weakness and almost deliberate connivance at wrong-doing. The responsibility for this of course lay with some of the great Powers, and England especially adopted a pro-Japanese attitude in the League. Ultimately the League appointed an international commission of inquiry into the Manchurian affair, under the chairmanship of Lord Lytton. This was readily agreed to by the Powers, as it meant postponing any decision for many months. Manchuria was far off, and it would take a long time for the commission to go there and report, and perhaps the matter might blow over by then.

  The Japanese withdrew from Shanghai, but they paid more attention now to Manchuria. They set up a puppet government there and proclaimed that Manchuria had exercised its right of self-determination. This new puppet State was named Manchukuo, and a seedy-looking youth, a descendant of the old Manchu rulers of China, was made the monarch of the new domain. Of course the whole thing was for show purposes only, and Japan was the real ruler. Everybody knew that if the Japanese army were removed the State of Manchukuo would topple over in a day.

  The Japanese had great trouble in Manchuria, for volunteer Chinese bands were continually fighting them. These bands are called by the Japanese “bandits”. Manchukuo armies, consisting of the local Chinese, were trained and equipped by the Japanese. When they were sent against the “bandits”, they walked over and joined the “bandits” with all their up-to-date equipment! Manchuria suffered greatly because of this incessant warfare, and the soya bean trade began to die out.

  After many months of inquiry the Lytton Commission presented its report to the League of Nations. It was a careful, moderate, and judicially worded document, but it was dead against Japan. This upset the British Government very much, as they were bent on protecting Japan. The consideration of the matter was put off for several months aga
in. At last the question had to be faced by the League. The American attitude had been very different from that of England; it was much more against Japan. America had declared that she would not recognize any change brought about forcibly by Japan in Manchuria or elsewhere. In spite of this strong American attitude, England, and to some extent France, Italy, and Germany, supported Japan.

  While the League was doing its best to avoid a decision, Japan took a new step. On New Year’s Day 1933, a Japanese army suddenly appeared in China proper and attacked the town of Shanhaikwan, which stands on the Chinese side of the Great Wall. There was shelling from big guns and destroyers, and bombing from aeroplanes; it was a thoroughly upto-date attack, and Shanhaikwan was reduced to a “smoking ruin”, and a large number of its civilian inhabitants lay dead and dying. And then the Japanese army marched on into the Chinese province of Jehol and approaching Peiping. The excuse was that the “ bandits “ used to make Jehol their headquarters for attacking Manchukuo, and that anyway Jehol was part of Manchukuo!

  This fresh aggression and the New-Year-Day massacre woke up the League and, largely because of the insistence of the smaller Powers, the League passed a resolution adopting the Lytton report and condemning Japan. The Japanese Government did not care in the least (for did it not know that some great Powers, including England, were backing it secretly?) and marched out of the League. Having resigned from the League, Japan quietly went on advancing on Peiping. It met with little or no resistance, and when the Japanese army almost reached the gates of Peiping, in May 1933, an armistice between China and Japan was announced. Japan had triumphed. It is not surprising that the Nanking Government and the present Kuomintang became very unpopular in China, after the pitiful exhibition which they gave against Japanese aggression.