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EW important issues between two major nations affect those nations exclusively or can nowadays be adjusted by those nations exclusively. This axiom expresses a condition of modern world progress which the great war has strikingly demonstrated. Issues between Japan and the United States, contacts which create these issues, and relations dependent on them cannot therefore be entirely separated from interests and policies of other nations in any comprehensive discussion. This is the broader view necessary to perspective.

Restricted to the Pacific basin, where its major elements must be worked out, the problem of the relations of Japan and the United States comprises two principal factors-direct contacts of the two governments and peoples, and conditions involved with the fate of China. Both factors are surcharged with forces making for international friction and war, yet I am amazed to find American public opinion little concerned about them. Americans are so engrossed with the terrific spectacle

presented in Europe that they seem to be blind or indifferent to a more sinister and more imminent menace to our peace and security that is creeping upon us from the opposite side.

A fact which this war must have driven into all strata of popular thought in America is the fallacy of assuming that even generous motives and good intentions of one people will always be understood and accepted by another people or nation as they are meant. As to Oriental peoples, and Japan in particular, Americans themselves know that collectively, and individually we wish them well, and that neither as people or nation do we harbor any hostile thoughts or invidious designs against them. What most Americans do not comprehend is that this sincere attitude of ours means little to the Japanese, who doubt its sincerity, and do not reciprocate. To most Americans, talk of war between Japan and the United States seems foolish, because most Americans do not perceive anything to fight about; and if the purposes of Japan as a nation, and the ideals.

of the Japanese as a people, vis-à-vis America, complemented the sentiments of Americans, then talk about war between these nations would be foolish. It is evident, then, that whatever elements of doubt now exist about this matter lie chiefly, with Americans, in ignorance about the real motives, ambitions, and purposes of Japan. Americans understand themselves well enough, and know that nationally we have no rancor and no designs for aggression; but how about the other fellow? It takes two to make a quarrel, but one can start a fight.

It may be as well to present my conclusions about some of these questions before my premises and argument, and I will summarize them as follows:

(a) Japan is making deliberate preparations in anticipation, if not actually in expectation, of a collision with the United States.

(b) Japanese popular thought and feeling have been deliberately prepared for this eventuality by the Government, and are extremely hostile toward the United States.

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(c) While Japanese statesmen have stimulated and formulated such a sentiment in Japan, a Japanese propaganda operating by various processes in America has almost succeeded in lulling our nation into a false security, and has prevented and retarded measures to prepare our nation against a clash.

(d) The fate of China, the stability of the Monroe Doctrine (now embracing the new ideal of Pan-Americanism), the balance of power in the Pacific Ocean, and whether a Yellow Peril ever will become a reality, are questions included in the outcome of the relations of Japan and the United States.

(e) The great war has destroyed the international balance of power in the far East, creating a condition disturbing the peace of that region, and by reaction also menacing the peace of America.

(f) Decided constructive action by the United States is required to recreate that balance of power in the settlement of the great war, and meanwhile this Govern

ment should strive energetically to preserve the status quo.

Put nakedly and abruptly, without the details and circumstances that build them up logically, these conclusions probably will astonish and startle Americans who have not closely followed events in the far East in the last decade. It is not feasible to give those details in this article, or to sketch more than their prominent features.

The result of the Russo-Japanese War gave Japan new outlooks, and launched her statesmen on a course of fresh ambitions. We need not revert to that war now except to mention the principal reasons Japan then gave for engaging in it, and which she used with great success to enlist the sympathy of Americans for her cause. Japan, as she told the world, went to war against Russia to preserve the independence of Korea, to maintain the "open door" in Manchuria, to assure the territorial integrity and political autonomy of China. Korea is now annexed to Japan, the "open door" in Manchuria is closed tightly, and Japan's course in the last year in attempting to bring China completely under Japan's suzerainty is too recent an event to require review. I take it that these facts will not be gainsaid now, although how Japan once denied intent to do any of those things is easily remembered; and in some cases she even officially denied the acts for some time after they were accomplished.

What I am now concerned with are Japan's governing motives in that series of acts and the violations of her solemn international obligations. For convenience, these motives may be divided as professed and real. Japan's real motives in those instances were her own national aggrandizement at the expense of weaker nations, and of strong ones, for that matter. Her professed motives varied somewhat, but in the cases of her annexation of Korea and the occupation of Manchuria, the professed motive was an alleged necessity to secure territory where Japan could send her surplus population. So persistently and with such plausibility was this idea propagated throughout the world that we