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THE NAVY ON THE YANGTSE.
234
It must be admitted that the essence of this
allegation
K
Yangtse
<
1.e. that the gunboats dare not go up the
devecte
is difficult to answer clearly because within
the area occupied by the Japanese the gunboats do move,
by and large, only in so far as the Japanese are prepared
to assent. In view of the overwhelming superiority of
the Japanese forces on the river and the possibility of
their closing the river by purely passive means at the
various booms (constructed originally by the Chinese),
it is obvious that movements in defiance of Japanese
wishes would involve a risk of incidents which might lead
to a very serious situation or to the gunboat being placed
in an extremely undignified position by being forced to
retire.
For these reasons the Board have taken the
view, up to now, that movements should take place after negotiation with the Japanese, where this is necessary, rather
than in defiance of the restrictions which they impose,
ostensibly for reasons of military necessity.
It 18,
however, undesirable to make any statement to this effect in so many words
L
since it could only strengthen the hand of those Japanese
elements which maintain that this country is not prepared
On
to risk war over the restrictions on navigation on the
Yangtse and thereby increase Japanese intransigeance.
the other hand it is equally undesirable to lay any
serious stress on the fact that the gunboats are after all,
operating in the midst of a major war, in which the
movements of third parties are inevitably restricted,
because the basis for our case against the Japanese
restrictions on the Yangtse is that, except in the area of operations against the main Chinese forces, there is no
longer any military necessity for refusing freedom of
movement to the vessels of third parties.
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