Western World v. Japan

In Rome and in London statesmen of the West last week began jockeying toward that boycott of Japan for which, in their eyes, President Roosevelt gave the cue when he recognized Nippon's most implacable foe, the Soviet Union.

As the crack Italian liner Conte di Savoia neared Naples, bearing roly-poly Comrade Maxim Maximovich Litvinoff from his triumph in Washington, the Italian Press burst with significant unanimity into a "tune" evidently called by Benito Mussolini. From the toe of the Italian boot to its strap among the Alps, Italians read that "Japanese dumping has become a new Oriental peril."

According to the Fascist Press Japan, by "unfairly" reducing the value of her yen, has created a "destructive" cut-price situation which the U. S., Europe and Soviet Russia should meet by "economic sanctions" against Japan. Fascist editors strongly hinted that Il Duce aspires to lead the West in organizing such a policy.

Comrade Litvinoff landed at Naples with a shout: "Here we are! The trip from America was grand!" On the train to Rome he flipped through the Papal daily Osservatore Romano which headlined CANNIBALISM IN RUSSIA and asserted the Russian people's "disillusionment and utter disinclination to work under the Communist regime." In Rome the roly-poly Red was received in private audience by His Majesty King Vittorio Emanuele III and held a series of conferences with Premier Mussolini at which they secretly discussed disarmament and the Japanese trade menace before Comrade Litvinoff entrained for Moscowr.

Meanwhile in London the House of Commons rang with this declaration by President Walter Runciman of the British Board of Trade: "We are having considerable trouble with Japan as a competitor and so is the whole Western World. It may be necessary for the Western World to stand together in the common economic cause."

One after another M. P.'s from Britain's stricken manufacturing districts damned Japan for dumping, for forging British trademarks, for sweeping many a British cargo boat off Far Eastern seas by debased yen competition. To champion Japan uprose only one M. P., that doughty Gladstonian Liberal. Sir Herbert Samuel, who lately led 33 Orthodox ("Free Trade") Liberals across the House from the Government benches. In his first opposition speech, Sir Herbert confined himself to cotton. Japan's commercial advantage in that field, he said, results from a well organized cotton textile industry "with which slipshod British methods would be unable to compete under any circumstances." With an eye cocked on the debased U. S. dollar, Sir Herbert claimed that it is not yet far enough down to make U. S. raw cotton cheaper in England than Indian cotton. He urged British textile men to buy only Indian cotton.

Sweeping Sir Herbert aside, other M. P.s rose to picture the "menace" represented by Japan's 42% increase in exports of cotton piece goods in the past three years, during which time similar British exports have fallen 54%.

"By no stretch of the imagination can Japanese commercial methods be considered fair!" cried a Conservative M. P. from Manchester. "State subsidies and depreciated currency are not legitimate factors in trade. They, together with the low standard of wages in Japan, and false labels on goods, are what are enabling that country to ruin this country. We do not want a fiscal war, but Great Britain is being mercilessly attacked and must defend itself while there is still something left to defend."

Summing up for His Majesty's Government, Trade Board President Runciman cried: "We have found that in some parts of the Empire goods have been imported direct from Japan bearing British names and trademarks. That is a form of dishonesty which any government should do its best to suppress.

"There appears to be a fairly general view that we should gain by abrogating the Anglo-Japanese treaty. ... I prefer to exhaust all other means before denouncing the treaty. We must not get the impression that Japan has beaten us. ... We are trying to impress the Japanese mind that it is well to live on a friendly footing with us rather than to carry their movement so far as to arouse, not only here but elsewhere, feelings of enmity. I believe we can improve our position, and no effort will be spared by the government in that direction."

With even Sir Herbert Samuel taking the view that the forging of foreign trademarks is a Japanese practice as common as it is indefensible, the House of Commons adopted without a single dissenting vote a motion praying His Majesty's Government to take every step within their power to defeat Japanese competition.

Directors of the Tokyo Electric Light Co. decided last week to repudiate the clause which gives holders of the company's debentures an option to receive payment in pounds or dollars at the old par gold value. The Japanese directors cited as their excuse the cancellation by the U. S. Congress of the gold clause in U. S. contracts. Many U. S. holders of their debentures, they complained, have been demanding and receiving payment in pounds which, to Japanese, seems unfair.

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