London, Dec. 29.
Japan is feeling the pinch, says the "Daily Telegraph" in commenting today on Japan's new step to mobilize her economic resources, as it describes the news that virtually the full provisions of the National Mobilization Act will be brought into force early in the New Year.
"Shorn of circumlocution," says the journal, "this means that Japan is feeling the pinch of her adventure in China, and sees herself compelled to bring her productive system under rigid control by the Government.
"The step is not altogether surprising, for the Government appears to be doing no more than exercise the full powers already conferred upon it but hitherto only partly implemented. Clearly, Japan is about to resort to what we call wartime economy, but what, in her case, more likely portends a permanent state of regulation of her economic life, at any rate so long as the present semi-dictatorial regime remains in power.
"Japan, it is true, has not yet adopted a professedly totalitarian system, but she is taking a long step towards the German exemplar.'—Reuter.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.