Out of a confused situation at Geneva it seems almost certain that, unless an eleventh-hour miracle occurs, the Committee of Nineteen will not be able to pro.
tory motion for the settlement of the Sino-Japanese issue. Conciliation will have to come later when the two disputants have made a closer and, perhaps, direct approach the one to the other. The Assembly, therefore, may charge its reference by reporting under Article XV of the Covenant, This report will obtain a statement of the facts ind recommendations. It may eventually become a report of the Council and it need not be endorsed by the parties to -the dispute. In the present circumstances it may be expected to contain a firm reassertion of the principles of the Covenant. It }will necessarily leave the Manchurian issue to be determined jin the fullest sense of the term when the attitudes of the two principals have undergone further modification. As this development approaches it is satisfactory to note that Japanese opinion less inclined to take the extreme view of its implications. In other words Tokyo is actively canvassing the opinion that Japan's membership of the ague need not necessarily jeopardised by the pul ition of report which, following closely the lines of the Lytton Com. mission's findings, is critical of Japanese actions without committing itself to expressions which can be reasonably construed as derogatory to the dignity of a member of the ingle ague. Impatient critics may scoff at the ingenuity which can straddle so apparently divergent views.- They may be consoled or corrected by reference to the Lytton Report which takes as its text the avoidance of condemnation and insists on the maintenance of principles with an ye to an eventual solution of highly delics Problem. Japan's difficulty in this matter is largely jof Japanese creation. Suggestions that japanese withdrawal from the League would be the logical outcome of this or that verdict at Geneva have mainly emanated from apologists, at Tokyo, h og General Araki or, at Ger uch as Mr. Matcuoka.
Those who, friends of the two countries involved in this dispute, have endeavoured to find way to conciliation, have been consistently hampered by Japan. ese interpretations placed in advance on proposals still in the Process of formulation. Thus, during the investigations by the Lytton Commission, Japanese spokesmen were all too alert in asserting that this or that course of inquiry would be regarded as hostile to Japan and make her break with the Lea The threat of sanctions whi could have been considered by responsible statesmen only for the purpose of exposing its impracticability was constantly referred to in Japan as if it were in imminent danger of being applied. Moreover Japan, with her eyes open, took several steps designed patently to create a position, withdrawal from which would be, to all intents and purposes, impossible. The device of Presenting to the world a accompli may be acceptable with-certain limits. Japanese; statesmen have surely to themselves whether not been inclined to pls excessive strain upon its powers of persuasion. Even now it is far from clear that the formal recognition of Manchukuo before the Lytton Report had been presented at Geneva can be justified by any valid claim of urgency. It is reasonable to contend that courtesy alone might have; dictated the maintenance of the transitional stage until the League had had an opportunity of hearing Mr. Matsuoka's defence of the creation of the infant state, It must be agreed that the League showed exceptional forbearance in treating that piece of claim jumping with dignified disregard of its implied challenge and proceeded to discuss the Lytton Report as if the recognition of Manchukuo by Japan had been an event discovered and not merely forecast. ed by that document. Judged by ordinary standards, Japanese
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.