May 16.
It is always a comparatively easy matter to deal with reasonable persons opposed to us whose, opinions are based upon mising formation. One has only to produce evidence of the truth, and, in the reasonable mind, opinions are readjusted to ha monize with fact. The really soul-trying struggle comes when tone has to do with a person in possession of the facts but who is already pledged to a mising pretation of them. The "Nationalist" propagandists great Britain and America, guid-fed in some instances by expert Soviet advice, therefore, do not deny reports of the events China which illustrate the state of anarchy in administrative affairs, the wretchedness of the Chinese people or the. intensity of the anti-foreign demonstrations: they simply misinterpret their significance and assign causes to each event which will make a strong appeal for China in the hearts of the millions of persons of generous spirits in the Anglo-Saxon countries who abominate the oppression and exploitation of the helpless.
As the Soviet plays upon Is-Jamie sentiments in Moslem countries by advertising Communism as the newest and truest interpretation of the inner spirit of the Koran and Red Russia as the appointed leader in a revised Pam-Islamic Movement; asthe Bolshevist agents in this country until very recently eschewed all discussion of the Marxian doctrines except in scholastic citcles, because they found the masses of thinking Chinese conined that theoretical Communism could not be applied in China, and devoted themselves to the culture of _anti-foreignism which they found everywhere embedded in Chinese trad ition; so in' the Occident they have' discovered and pressed into yeoman service that spirit] of fair play which they, on their record throughout Europe and Asia, have the least possible right to evoke, A few misguided spokesmen in Moscow have, from time to time injured th cause by denouncing damaging. evidence from China as unsound, but the really clever agents in Great Britain and America have Tost successfully camouflaged both Soviet activity in China and the anti-foreign character of "Nationalism", through—nation-ie appeals to a generosity of of which they themselves} wholly incapable.
Before expanding—_further upon this theme, it would—be well to illustrate it by quoting here a resolution passed by "the Executive Committee of thi Union of Democratic Control, April 13, 1927, which has been sent us for publication, "The Union of Democratic Control declares that the action of Government in pouring} troops into China is inflaming antic British feeling amongst the Chine endangering British lives and is ly responsible for the deaths which have already taken place.
"It condemns the Government's refusal to agree to an impartial! inquiry into the events at Nanking, and is of the opinion that Actions of the Government appear' ito indicate that there are forces behind it which are seeking any Jexcuse for armed intervention for ithe purpose of retaining and se-louring privileges inconsistent with Chinese self-determination.
"Believing that the only way of solving the Chinese problem is to Jabandon the unequal treaties and to settle all remaining differences by peaceful and friendly negotiation, it} Is upon its constituent bodies' resist in every possible way any attempt of the Government to rush [the country into another wicked and wasteful war."
Very few of our local readers would have to be convinced that this document is founded upon ignorance of the whole background of recent events and jupon a misinterpretation of China's needs, of the temper of the Chinese people, of the purpose of gunboats and foreign farmed forces in China, of th effect which their presence ha: had upon the situation, of the fruits of conciliation "through peaceful and friendly negotia tion" and of what unchecked and untrammelled "self-determination" would mean for the wretched Four Hundred Millions. We should probably be guilty of no little injustice if we called into question the honesty of purpose of the persons who sembled and drafted this resolution. It is upon the very' honesty of purpose and benevoifence of such groups that Red propaganda abroad is playing when it prompts our own people to organize and ery out for measures which would entail the final destruction of the whole foreign establishment in China, this country's descent into a state of anarchy which Soviet Russia would have a free hand ito foster, and the rapid spread, through both propaganda and and contagion, of similar condi tions to every other Asiatic country.
This is clear enough, certainly, but how to go about the task lof undoing such work among the Ivory people at Home upon whom we should naturally rely for sympathy and support in our dangerous and trying situation, fs by no means so clear. When [gruesome outrages upon foreigners can be explained at Home in a sentence, as unhappy incidents inseparable from revol lutions and the upward struggle lof an oppressed people; when the miseries inflicted from end to end of the Land by militarists, "Nationalists," Communists, and bandits upon' th> miserable Chinese people are accepted as; temporary' inconveniences ineidental to the evolution of a modern democracy from a barbara ous feudal system, or lightly Jand satisfactorily explained as the result of strictures put upon national development by' the "unequal treaties;" the news lof more outrages, still heavier losses sustained by merchants and missionaries and of fresh, hardships suffered by all classes of Chinese conveys nothings to our people at Home but the impression that the struggle between the forces of light and darkness is growing more intense and that it is more imperative than ever that we should either remove our troublesome treaty-bound person4 to give the forces of light more elbow, room or should abandon our, alliances with the forces of darkness and come out openly the champions of the To gi persons abroad, into whom this "sympathetic understanding" of China's problems has been ins-_ tilled, sufficient background to appreciate how criminally foolish it sounds to us, would require endlessly long explenations for which there is neither tine nor opportunity. Think-of the space that would have to devoted to ancient and modern history, the personnel of the Nanking "Nationalist" regime and the records of the leading figures, the circumstances und: which this regime flourishes in a city from which foreigners have been excluded through the most brutal outrage since the Boxer movement, to explain why the following lines in Mr. C. C. Wu's statement of policy, which publish to-day, are both misleading and impertinent:
"The resentment of the Chinese] to the foreigner is not to tim individually but to the system udder which he lives. The Chinese object not to the pfesente of the foreigner, but to his position of privilege The Chinese people, respective of geographical situation fand political creed are all united in demanding international justice and fair play. In the interest of the peace and welfare of the world, such a simple and reasonable request by quarter of the human race ough? not to made in vain."
Tt does sound simple and reasonable; and the task of proving, in as few words as Mr. Wu has used, to masses of fair minded who know nothing of]
that it is neither simple nor reasonable is an impossible' one. To have it clearly understood abroad that the system lurider which the foreigner lives, to which Mr. Wu objects on behalf of China, is essential to the survival here of the indivi-Jdual to whom there is no objection, calls at once for such long review of China's foreign relations tht no one abroad could be expected to read it. Such propaganda, indeed, cannot be answered in words but, can only be countered by events. Every gesture of conciliation in response to such appeals as Mr. Wu's, is and will continue to be inevitably followed by disaster, just as the Chen-O'Malley agreement was followed by anlarchy and Boxerism throughout the Yangtze Valley. Our cal-jam ities answer—misrepresentation of fact more eloquently than Jany volume of written argument, and our only task, as they sue-ceed one another, must be show as clearly as we can how the conciliatory policy, forced upon our Governments by misguided public opinion at Home, stands to calamity in China in {the relations of cause to effect.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.