Sune iM.
The deliberate policy of encroachment upon the right of the foreign resident" of this International Settlement to regulate]
's affairs according to their own liking, whether there are Chinese Jwho choose to reside within its bounds or not, and the policy of organized interference with its affairs, are too obviously manifest now for either the Council Jor the ratepayers to ignore. A supine attitude in the face of the activities of the "Nationalists" within the Settlement, Jctearly designed to undermine the authority of the Counc! force concessions which would, lonly serve to license and inspire further encroachments, and fin-jolly to get such a grip upon the overwhelmingly big Chinese population, through propaganda and terrorism, that the last vestiges of foreign contro! could be easily swept away, must be bandoneé at once if' Shanghai is to be saved as a base for the reconstruction of trade when sanity returns.
When the "Nationalists" came here, heralded by their Soviet propaganda organization and still directed in their military operations by a host of Red ad-issers, they were confident of] taking over Shanghai as they had taken over the British Con—ssion in Hankow and of sweeping the place clean of foreigners as they swept Nanking. All will remember how shocked and. grieved they were when they found the barricades up, the curfew in force and the Settlement adequately patrolled by military and naval forces whom—their rabble could not be counted upon. to face. Profoundly annoyed, they retired to Nanking to think it over and assembled there experts in trouble making, financial Jjugglery and mendacious propaganda, to. consider ways and jincans. Having laid their plans they declared war upon the Settlement by reviving and intensifying anti-foreign feeling, plastering the environs of _the [Settlement with gruesome posters, stimulating meetings at} which the mobs were. inflamed by the usual grotesque lies and filling the daily papers, includig those published in the Settle-' ment, with the most outrageous slanders upon the foreign soldiery_in Shanghai, many of them so filthy that they could not even be reproduced in their most) organs.
Against this form of attack no army of defence. however large, while confined to the bounds of the Settlement, is of the slightest service. No organ but the Municipal Council can plan and execute a counter-attack and, so far as we know, the Council's only acknowledgement lof a declaration of war has been the licence to operate issued to the Publicity Bureau, The announcement by the Nanking publicity agents of meddlesome measures contemplated and designed to ruin Shanghai, have therefore come thick and fast.
The Whangpoo Conservancy' Board is to be reorganized, the telegraphs are to be tampered with, the Post Office continues to operate fifty per cent. below efficiency, the Chung Yang Bank (Central' Bank of China), now established in the Russo-Asiatic Bank building, is to issue notes fon the local market, while the Chinese commercial population is inspired to clamour against the barbed wire and the curfew so that subversive influences may more easily be introduced into the Settlement and blackmail agents can operate without} check. These are the little: things, which when ignored, pave the way for the big things.
The Customs surtaxes, contributions to war and the least of anti-foreign propaganda, pronounced illegal in the protest by all the Protocol Powers and still subject to protest, have! been collected on imports within the Settlement for some months and are now to be collected on exports. A loan, which is supposed to yield between thirty and forty million dollars, is forced upon Kiangsu and, because no Jadequate measures have been taken to protect the Ohinese re-Isidents of the Settlement, it has} been as easy to intimidate firm: under our protection into subscribing heavily as to blackmail! those under purely Chinese jurisdiction, When a Chinese, community under foreign protec: tion can be sufficiently brow-beaten to part with the capital that it has hoarded under foreign flags for safe keeping, that} Chinese community can be made to commit any conceivable folly and our "Nationalist" neigh-hours propose to see that our] Chinese residents are goaded into a state of open rebellion against us. Security is the secret of Shanghai's success as} jo commercial port and the one inducement to the Chinese who} have crowded into the Settlement to assist in the maintenance of order and to abide by the regulations designed for their betterment. When we do nothing to protect them against the impositions and misgovernment from which they have taken refuge] with us, security is gone and with it has gone our only claim upon their loyalty. If they are not safe under our administra-ition, if they are to be looted in the midst of a well equipped defence force and a police system which they support with taxes, they are going to be ruined as certainly as though they lived in Wusih or Hangchow, and there is no reason why they should turn a deaf ear to alluring antiforeign propaganda, inder such conditions, the' greater the force and equipment! for defence, the' greater is the! Chinese contempt for us; the most ostensible our available] power, the greater simpletons we seem when we can make no effective opposition to campaign that is bound to. bring about our speedy ruin, The more we appear to contemplate concessions to open enemies, a fatuous desire to create an atmosphere of good will and brotherly love in which we can
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.