The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-02-14
ANGLO-JAPANESE TREATY.
NEG GoTIATION or IT NOT WHOLLY
 SECRET.

as to Russia's Probable Course-State'
 ments of the Trepty's Aims in ParIia-
 ment.
 London, Feb. 19.-Tne parliamentary
 secretary of foreign affairs, Lord Cran-
 borne, replying, in the house of com
 mons to-day, to Henry Norman, Lib
 eral, who asked whether the Anglo
 Japanese treaty of alliance was com
 municated to the United States govern ment before it's text was published and, ! if so, whether the government of the
 United States expressed any opinion
 thereon said the substance of the
 agreement was communicated to the | United States government before pub 1 lication, The United States did not ex- ! press any opinion. The substance of
 the agreement was also communicated 1 to Germany.
 Lord Cranborne added that Man
 churia was no more excluded from the
 scope of the agreement than any other province of the Chinese empire.
 
 British-Japanese treaty on the ground 1 that it was evidently an anti-Russian | threat and that it tied Great Britain to the wheels of Japanese policy, where by she might be forced to go to war against her own interests. Lord Cranborne explained that the contracting parties were only bound to undertake mutual defense of their in- terests when the danger was due to ag-
 gression of others, and the power called
 upon to help the other must judge
 whether the conditions of the treaty
 had been fulfilled.
 Lord Cranborne said Russia had rec ognized Japan's special position in Co., req, by the agreement of 1898, and al- most every power had endorsed the principle of the open doors and the ter ritorial integrity of China. The new treaty. therefore, was merely along lines already accepted by almost every power. Great Britain's commercial po- sition in China was of the greatest i'm portance, and who could say what it's importance would become in the future, with China's infinite capacity for eX- pansion? Great Britain's commercial position, though great, was not unchal- lenged. Spheres of influence did not suit her. She wanted the whole of China open to industrial enterprise. The government was bound to take every care in safeguarding its commercial rights in the Orient. Japan's special in- terest was governed by her geograph1- cal position. Her army and Great Britains' navy were acting in concert and were peculiarly able to maintain the foregoing policy.
 Lord Cranborne said in conclusion that he would supplement his statement regarding the United States by saying
 Throughout all the doings of China the relations between Great Britain and the United States were marked by the greatest cordiality. At almost every crisis and in the case of every small difficulty which had arisen during the negotiations at Pekin, the United Staets and British representatives had always acted together. There is no doubt that in this agreement we shall command the full approval of the government of the United States
 This statement was received with cheers.
 The liberal leader, Sir Henry Camp bell Bannermann, thought that the in- dicital interests of Great Britain. the United States and Japan could have been sufficiently secured by an inter- change of notes, instead of by an ex- picit undertaking of this kind.
 The government leader, A. J. Bal | four, said there seemed to be an inn pression that something hostile to peace was behind the agreement That was not so. The treaty was not based | on secret information of impending dangers but, on the broad facts of Brit ish interests. The treaty made strong ly for peace, because even the most ad- ventUrous nation would shrink from at lacking Japan with the knowledge that Great Britain would also be encoun- tered The treaty was not unfriendly to other nations It would, MT. Bal four hoped, have sobering effect on the continental schools of thought, which imperilled the worlds peace An of notes would have result ed in ambiguity.
 The foreign secretary, Lord Lans- iowne, in the house of lords to-day. made a somewhat similar reply on the subject of the new dual alliance, to the ,ne made in the house of commons. He added that nothing in the agreement lid violence to the accepted policy of he other powers. So far as the treaty the integrity of China, Man 'huria must be taken as forming part ,f the Chinese empire. The object of he alliance was three-fold-the main enance of the status quo, the policy of he open door, and the maintenance of ] ,eace in the far east
 No other powers interested in the far asst were at all comparable with those if Great Britain and Japan. While it vas true that the alliances of Great Britain with other powers had been re- 'arded heretofore with considerable ne frankly declared that the government was not going to be de- , erred by those considerations or admit hat because an agreement involved 8 eparture from the policy of isolation it f vas therefore open to adverse criti- , ism. They saw on all sides the ten- g ency of the great powers to form f roups and the ever increasing naval f nd military armaments. involving ever ( increasing burdens. Tn these days wars roke out with a suddenness which was ot the case in former years. So the