certum y
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burden, have actually proved an asset in the
agricultural development of a virgin country.
He declares that the Russians repeatedly
seized the opportunity to launch an attank when-
ever the Japanese weakened their forces on the
frontiers, or when their divisions were in process
of replacement.
The Russians have always maintained
an excellent intelligence network behind the Japanese
lines.
He has a very low opinion of the fighting forces
of both Japan and Russia, but considers that, of the | two, the former are superior. The Soviet air force
is of particularly low standard, both as regards
personnel and machines. He says that the Japanese
habitually understate their casualties, and bum the
bodies of he dead at night after a battle with
Russians or bandits, in order o conceal their losses
from the Chinese. lie estimates their total loBBCA
in Manchuris since the Mukden Incident at 100,000
killed. He feels convinced that the Japanese would
not stand up to a modern European army. When things
go well, they are full of boisterous confidence, but
he has seen detachments of their defeated troops re-
treat before kussions or bandits in disorder and ab-
ject terror.
Speaking of internal conditions in Siberia,
which he claims to know intimately, Mr. Vespa des-
cribed the Five Year Plans as a gigantic bluff. Away
from the main Siberian railway confusion and the
*
most abject poverty prevail. In his opinion, the
cause of much that has occurred in the Soviet Union
in recent years, including the "purges" of 1936 to
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