1938-10-10 — Page 26

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BREAD is the

essential food.....

IT IS THE ACCOMPANIMENT OF HALF THE THINGS WE

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LANE, CRAWFORD'S

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HOVIS,

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APPRAISAL OF THE CONFLICT

(Continued from Page 13) strict, and some, gold has been sold. The gold cover is high, at almost 40 per cent. Prices, how- ever, are generally rising.

As to morale, is it almost al- ways easy to have good morale when you have good machine-guns.. The Japanese, a tough and deter- mined people, facing what they freely concede to be a titanic job, are not showing much sign of weakening, at least on the sur- face. I don't know what is going on, if anything, underneath the surface. I doubt if anyone does. The war is not popular. There is no doubt of that, even though war-time economy has given a fillip to both patriotism and busi- ness. But revolution will never be easy in Japan, unless the army itself makes it, or unless there should be a sudden, spectacular, and complete defeat.

CHINESE MORALE MAGNIFICENT

Chinese morale is magnificent. There is no other word. The war is popular with them. The Chin- ese may lack money and supplies, they may lack even primitively efficient munitions, but they have put up a fight against the enor- mously better-equipped Japanese that staggers the imagination. The Japanese thought it would be all over in three months. But it may-it may-last three more years. All over China, from the most competent and experienced observers, I heard the same story: that the Japanese, fighting to keep China from becoming united and strong, have, up to the present at least, produced just what they sought to prevent a strong, unit- ed China. Japanese bombs have brought the menace of Japan to villages which had scarcely ever heard of Japan. Refugees have carried their tale of woe and re- nascent nationalism to the remot- est parts of the interior. Boys are drilling with broomsticks for ser- vice in a national army in pro- vinces where the very idea of a national army would have been scoffed at two years ago. A new China has been born. If only it survives.

There are two dangers to China in the way of morale. One is the possibility that the Japanese may conceivably succeed in buying some of the provincial leaders. The second, only a very remote possibility at present, is a split between the Red Army and the Kuomintang. But the Japanese themselves have served to mini- mize these possibilities, because they have so aroused the country that everyone hates them more than he hates rival Chinese, Ja- panese cément has unified China.

If you ask me what I think the next stage of the war. will be how, in other words, the dead- lock will shape up-I hesitantly offer the following idea: I think that, following an undeclared war, there may eventually be an undeclared peace.

The Japanese will probably in- trench themselves behindthe Lunghai railway and the Tien- tsin-Pukow.railway. In that way they would have rail manoeuver ability and, if they built concrete and steel fortifications, they would probably be impregnable to frontal attack, since the Chinese, are so weak in artillery. The Chinask

dre, wonderfully stub.. born in retreat; they shrewdly base their tactics on making any Japanese advance extremely ex- pensive. But they have as yet, only small attacking power. Therefore if the Japanese dig in

they may have a fair chance of holding this vast region. They are already beginning to exploit it, that is, make the Chinese popula- tion itself pay for the rest of the

war.

い

I don't think that the Japanese- have any zest to proceed beyond Hankow, and I don't think they would attempt to pursue Chiang Kai-shek to Chungking or Yun- nanfu. Nor would it be necessary to negotiate with him. They could adopt their favourite tactics of ignoring his regime, pretending that it isn't there in fact, as things are at present, negotia- tions are impossible technically, since the Japanese do not recog- nise that he exists. This sounds odd, but the decision to withdraw recognition was taken with the. Emperor's sanction, and it will not be too easy to revive Chiang if such a move indicates that the Emperor, by inference, was. wrong. The Japanese can dis-* miss Chiang as a bandit, dare him to attack them, retire behind a

By John Gunther

(in the Nation.)

steel wall, and wait.. Undeclared. peate.

HOPE IN GUERILLAS -

The obstacle to this Japanese- plan of a long deadlock, a fraying out of hostilities, and an eventual undeclared peace is the Red or Eighth Route Army. I am in- clined to believe that the key to the outcome is this army (which isn't, strictly speaking, as much a "Commünist" army as most peo- ple believe) and its subsidiary armies, more than any other fac- tor. I think that the Red Army, if it continues to receive supplies -it must have some supplies, even though its prowess is for- midable in living off the country and off the Japanese—is more vital to the Chinese cause than any economic drain in Tokyo. If the guerrillas trained by the Eighth Route Army can continue. to harass Japanese communica-- tion, raid Japanese-occupied ter- ritory, and in general make havoc behind the Japanese lines, it may take years for the Japanese to consolidate their gains. The pre- sent campaigns seem to show that the Chinese cannot beat the Ja panese front-to-front. You cannot fight an artillery barrage with a. whistle. But you can fight it by tackling it from behind, which is what the guerrillas are trying to do. I have seen nicely shaded maps showing the territory the Japanese have "occupied." HalfTM of this is in reality guerrilla ter- ritory, though it is far behind the lines. On the other hand, in order to keep up their sensationally stimulating struggle, the guer-. rilas need close liaison with the rest of China, which the fall of Hankow and a further Japanese: advance might imperil.

If I have seemed unduly pes- simistic in some passages of this article, let me end on another- note. One of the best military men in China told me that this war, if it has accomplished noth-- ing else, has at least indicated that the Japanese are not quite, so invulnerable as many experts thought. "Any first class Euro- pean army, with proper equip- The ment, even' the Italian army,” "said, "could drive the Japanese,

into the sea in six months."