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commerce discussed the matter, as though it were some sort of trap to catch you, for so long that we, who realised that a continued boycott of any Power would merely serve to complicate the situation in its later phases, moved of our own accord and at our own expense to suppress it in the Yang-tsze Valley, the only place with which we were at that time directly concerned. Your people may have regarded this as a fine stroke of diplomacy, and no doubt reaped all the kudos to be had for inducing the Chinese to themselves suppress a boycott against you without any expense to yourselves other than the losses already suffered by lack of trade. But to us it was clear that on the mental side of your political equipment the science of comparative psychology was non-existent. In such circumstance it was clear to us that we could not rely upon you for the guidance and help that we had in the past both looked for and received.
Were this an isolated instance, one might be inclined to overlook it, but such was not the case. You rubbed the lesson in even harder in your negotiations entered into with a view to assist the Hong Kong community out of their troubles. We expressed our surprise at this, but the explanation was forthcoming; it was that the boycott here and the Hong Kong position could be regarded as part and parcel of the same policy, only the Hong Kong and Kwangtung situation being so much further developed, the leaders on the Chinese side considered that it was time military action was taken against the Red party at Canton.
Such action had been delayed for two reasons: the first was that one prominent and able leader considered that the forces at their disposal, while numerically powerful enough, were too ill equipped to be able to meet the red forces with the certainty of success, and the second was finance. The latter difficulty was more or less overcome by the Chinese themselves, but the problem of equipment remained. It was this problem of equipment that formed the base of the negotiations as between the leaders of the anti-Red forces, on the one side, and the representatives of Great Britain and the Government of Hong Kong on the other.
A prompt reply to a definite question would have saved much in both lives and money, but, as before, negotiations were dragged along until such time as one section of the anti-Red leaders grew tired of what they regarded as procrastination on your part, and took the field, ill-equipped as they were, and this notwithstanding the fact that during the period under discussion many thousands of rifles and hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammunition had been seized by the Hong Kong authorities as contraband, which we offered to purchase.
The result is history; the anti-Reds were beaten, not through lack of fighting qualities, but through lack of equipment, as their more able leaders foresaw they would be, and this at a time when there were thousands of rifles and possibly millions of rounds of ammunition rusting somewhere in charge of the Hong Kong authorities, equipment which we offered to purchase for purposes of fighting your battle more than
our own.
When a definite reply was received, it was full of sympathy for our plight, but no action could be taken, nor could we by any means obtain the equipment we required because forsooth a British Order in Council had been promulgated whereby the import, export and sale of arms and ammunitions to China had been forbidden. In other words, we, a sovereign Power, were forbidden to purchase war equipment in the open market by you, who had no more right to do so than I have to vote in the Paris municipal elections.
Here the writer humbly ventured a correction, and pointed out that what was described as a British Order in Council had nothing to do with it; that it was an agreement come to by all the foreign Powers that counted and was entered into by all the Powers, including China, at a time when it was thought to be for China's protection and for the purpose of preventing China becoming a dumping ground for left-over war material. Such being the case, as was her habit, Great Britain was only keeping her word in common with the other Powers in the letter and spirit of that agreement. We soon wished we had not ventured this correction, for reasons which we shall explain to-morrow.
In response to our remonstrance were were promptly told that if we were really of opinion that the agreement referred to had been adhered to right from its inception we were more gullible than had we any right to be and at the same time be at large.
That the agreement never had been more than wastepaper, for arms and ammunition had continuously come into the country, as anyone with eyes to read could read for themselves, the actual result of such Order in Council was, on the one
hand, to flood the country with smuggled arms and ammunition, which was rendered available to every work-shy waster with a taste for armed robbery who could raise the price of a pistol. Hence the prevalence of armed robbery to-day, and, on the other, to burden an already over-embarrassed Government, who were thereby reduced to smuggling arms themselves or see the country controlled by bandits better armed than the Government force. If, as the writer asserted, the agreement had been kept both in spirit and letter, where have all the arms and ammunition in this country outside of Government control come from? The proportion that can be traced to renegade soldiers who have sold their equipment is a very small one indeed, and is quite distinguishable on capture from the vast amount of various makes of rifles and pistols that have never been in the possession of the Government. This, however, does not matter; our point of view is that when you saw that we were actively menaced by a danger common to both, you should have taken immediate steps to rescind that order; if you could not do it yourself by virtue of your agreement with other Powers, you should have used the same influence with them to break it as you did to make it, but you never made the attempt. If you had done so we should at any rate have known that you were sincere in your protestations of friendship, and have known who to blame.
Hong Kong has paid for your laisser faire policy to the tune of something like 150 million sterling, and will go on paying until such time as the Chinese themselves are in the position to oust the elements which have caused the disruption, as we have ceased to expect anything like assistance, and we are rapidly coming to the conclusion that you are not competent to advise.
At this we could do no other than express our contrition and regret that we should be so regarded by the thinking elements of China, and proferred in extenuation the fact that we are resident in Hankow and consequently quite out of touch with events in the south, thus switching the conversation on to the events here and in the north.
We are apparently just as much to blame here; we have profited nothing by the lesson of Hong Kong; all we have learned of the ruin and destitution brought to Russia and, indeed, every other country where Bolshevism has obtained anything like a foothold, has not been sufficient to awaken us to the danger that menaces us, not China alone. Our danger is your danger, too, said our friend; in fact, we are merely a piece on the chess board of Soviet politics, the ultimate end of the game being the complete elimination of every foreigner except the Russians from China. You cannot fail to see this; your House of Commons is well aware of it, and have been for a long time, and the fact that your leaders of thought are aware of it has been published throughout the world. What steps are you taking to overcome this menace?
Instead of concentrating on this world menace and devising means to combat it, every foreign Power, with the exception of Russia, who is strictly attending to her own business in the Sovietisation of China, has joined in a wild scramble for China's chimerical favours in Peking. You are indulging in an orgy of expensive conferences engendered at the bidding of a consortium of bankers out of which no possible good can come. The hostility among the Powers, though well disguised and wrapped away in the folds of diplomatic language, is there for those who can read with understanding to see, and this international trade grab can only breed an off-spring of future trouble for all concerned, and all the while you are laughed at by the one Power you should be closely watching, who thanks whatever gods there be for concentrating your attention on futile conferences, thus giving further time for the extension of a policy and acts which should have been nullified at their inception. Of what value will be the abolition of extra-territoriality, of what value will be an increased tariff to China or to the Powers if China succumbs to the Bolshevik menace? Do the bankers think they will ever get their money? If once the Third International gains control of China you will whistle for it or, alternatively, stage a disastrous war to recover it. In any case you lose either way.
There must be sufficient brains among the Powers somewhere to realise these facts. Why do they not speak out or stir up their Governments to some action? Instead of doing something besides talking, you stand by and leave one man to fight a common foe; not only this, by your actions you handicap him at every turn. By what right do you penalise us with your agreements, which prevent us getting the arms and ammunition which is vitally necessary to us in our fight against this Red menace, and at the same time stand by and take no action against the up-to-date You cannot arming and equipping of the forces fighting on the Bolshevik side?
plead ignorance; you know it as well as we know it. You leave us only two conclusions either you are all afraid of Russia or you would like to see China
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