Mar. 30.
Is spite of the statements appearing from time to time from very different quarters that there is no chance of China twning Bolshevist, we cannot but be impressed by the news that one part of the country is already in league with the Soviet, namely Canton. No doubt Canton will deny the report we published yesterday, taken from Chinese press; but such denial will not carry much weight in view of the fact that a Russian Bolshevik agent is at present in Canton, while it is many months since General Chen Chiung-ming showed a distinct trend in that direction. Over and above that, it may be remembered that literature of the strongest communistic type, reproducing the writings of Kropotkin, Bakounin and similar writers, was introduced into China from Tokio ten years ago and more, and that many of these books (printed in Chinese) bore the name of Dr. Sun Yat-sen. Of course Dr. Sun has probably refined his views to a considerable extent in the meantime, but there is certainly no lack of people in Shanghai who believe that Kuangtung must now be considered as the great Bolshevik stronghold of China. That in itself is serious enough, but even more serious is the situation at our doors. It can no longer. be ignored that here in Shanghai, efforts are being made to Bolshevize the industrial classes.
For long it has been well-known that followers of the Soviet, some being duly accredited agents and others mere free lances, were endeavouring '0 make Shanghai their happy hunting ground. Their original plans were crude, and a stern intimation that no violent tactics would be countenanced, nipped their efforts in the bud. Since then, however, they, or their success sors, have proceeded in a more insidious but more effective manner, and it seems impossible to avoid the conclusion that gol? from Moscow, or some other Soviet base, has furnished them with the necessary material support. It was no easy business to introduce propaganda among the classes of Chinese whom they specially wished to influence. They tried it with the soldiery by leaving pamphlets (in Chinese) in the tea-houses which they were known to frequent. This mode of work was defeated by the -simple fact that very few soldiers can read, but the local military authorities made doubly sure by imposing a very strict censorship on all literature. The propagandists, however, were not to be discouraged, and they soon found that the leaders of the in dustrial classes contained a number who could digest a fairly simple document. Such documents were soon to hand, and Bolshevism couched in attractive language made a distinct appeal. There was also the favouring circumstances of a good deal labour unrest, with the labouring classes falling more and more under the influence of their chosen or self-appointed leaders. Easier hours of work, more pay, better housing, a free distribution of land and probably of wealth, with no rich idlers in the community grinding the faces of the poor—all this could be acquired by adoption of the Soviet doctrine. It was no longer a fiction, for had it not been done in Russia? The same could easily be carried through in China. The leaders snapped at the bait, the
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.