Japan has so many "life lines" now flung Out that it can be understood why there is a certain amount of apprehension as to where the "life line" might next to found to be attached. At first it was Manchuria, Then it was North China, And later, with the spread of the Sino-Japanese conflict, the further end of the line has been found to be in Central and South China. In fact, the quite justifiable suspicion has been germinated that the whole continent of Asia may eventually be considered by certain politicians and spokesmen in the capital of a small group of islands as a necessary "life line." This explains the uneasiness felt in the Netherlands East Indies, reflected in the comment reproduced to-day from the "Sydney Morning Herald" and counteracted by the Amsterdam "Telegraaf," over the position of the Netherlands East Indies. These islands, so nen in many of the world's most coveted produces, have been the cause of international quarrels in the past. At that time the sea power of Holland had not declined, and the profit to be derived from possible encroachments in that area was distinctly problematical. At present, however, the threat or potential threat to the Netherlands East Indies comes from a quarter unsuspected before. There is the expansion of Japan throughout the South Sea or Pacific islands mandated to that Power through the League of Nations which shows an undeniable trend towards empire in the south. The Japanese have done a great work in the islands of the Pacific—so great a workethat many independent observers have become nervous lest a firm footing for a step still further south has not been prepared. Hence the uneasiness over the future of the N.EL All this may, of course, be a figment of the imagination built out of overanxious examination of maps and theoretical valuations of strategical advantages. Imaginative or theoretical, however, the suppositions play an important enough part in national considerations to merit serious attention. Therefore, there must inevitably be, in spite of official denials from Amsterdam, a special significance in the intended visit of the Governor-General of Australia to the Netherlands East Indies, To say the least, it shows the realization that some day in the remote future, these two countries may be bound together by the "ties of common fuk"
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.