Peking, March 7.
By_ uniting under one banner all the factions which see in the person of Wu Pei-fu an_ obstacle in the path of their particular political ambitions, which fear him as the potential enemy of vested political <jnterests in China or of the traditional prerogatives of the Mandarinate, Chang Tso-lin and his Old, Chiaotung advisers have built up an alliance, a big bed full of strange bedfellows, which, when sketched from the Fengtien point of view, looks overwhelmingly powerful. Anyone familiar with Chinese politics and Chinese wars as they go will, however, see in the "unholy alliance" and its plans. as the writer reported them yesterday, fully as many seeds of failure as of success. In many respects this is the biggest political structure which has been erected on Chinese soil since Tsai Ao found the weak spot in Yuan Shih-kai's impressive _political edifice; but in this, too, there are many imposing arches with mud keystones which the intelligent outsider can find for himself with a little scrutiny and which any Chinese will lay his hand on intuitively, without instruction.
Tue Want or UNSELFISHNESS.
The first great weakness, so far as the permanent character of the alliance goes is that it is founded upon no fundamental, unselfish ambition, inspiring the component factions to mutual loyalty, mutual self-sacrifice or more than temporary mutual support. The common_ objective is superficial. It consists solely in the desire to' get Wu Pei-fu out of the way. The Canton Government wants to acquire control of two roads to the Yangtze, one through Hunan, another through Kiangsi.
Chen Chiung-ming wants a footing on the Yaigtze so that a Southern confederacy of liberal provinces can be consolidated, with the Yangtze as the boundary and offer real rivalry to the stolid, unprogressive North. Sun Yat-sen's ambitions go further. To him the Yangtze is half way to Peking. Wuchang is the half way point to Peking and the presidency. In the mind of either man an alliance Mice anp Men.
This is a survey of the present and future from the Fengtien point of view. It is not fiction, nor is it guesswork: it is a reliable summary of definite plans, gleaned from reliable sources. As it happens there is another side to the picture. There are many and large loopholes in these schemes.which threaten them with the usual fate of the plans of mice and men, but to avoid making this article formidably long in type that no one will have the courage to start it, an account of the flaws in these particular plans will be saved for another article.
Too Many Personal Ambitions for Good Combining with Chang Tso-lin, Tuan Chi-jui or Liang Shih-yi is only a temporary means to an end and neither contemplates enjoying pleasant relations over a protracted period with any of these persons after the desired foothold on the Yangtze is acquired.
Chang Tso-lin, Tuan Chi-jui_and Liang Shih-yi know this and Ghen Chiung-ming knows they know it. Sun Yat-sen may have fleeting suspicions that these present allies and potential enemies in the North have fathomed his ultimate purpose, but he is probably too much. obsessed with the notion at. this moment that they have '"submitted" to him to admit it to himself. Mutual suspicions are nevertheless set aside for the nonce while the alliance promises -to remove the great obstacle to Southern' expan-oun in the Yangtze Valley. Wu el-fu.
Cuane Tso-Lin's One Harnep.
Chang Tso-lin is using the South, using Tuan Chi-jui, using Wang Chan-yuan and Chang Chin-yao, using Liang Shih-yi and his following of bankers and railway men, to the same immediate end. He may contemplate using some of the Northerners after Wu Pei-fu is removed, as subordinates or tools, but he does not contemplate using the Southern elements for anything. He proposes to.crush them, to put such an end to the sputtering of these absurd Cantonese fanatics that two will not dare to meet together and quack about such nonsense as democracy and constitutionalism for a generation to come. He is not going to let old Tuan resume the Peiyang leadership either. Old Tuan is not a bad fellow and his military following is exceeding useful, but with Tuan in a supreme position the Anfu organization will come back. And when the Anfu organization is re-established Little Hsu will appear at the top of it. If there is any' man in China whom Chang Tso-lin fears and hates, it is Little Hsu. Does anyone suppose that Tuan Chi-jui and his advisers are unaware of this, or that they look forward to submitting quietly to the dictatorship of the Manchurian upstart, that
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.