The Washington times., 1923-09-04
DISASTER SEEN
ASPEACE AID
ON PACIFIC
japan Must Now Turn to Vast
Work of Rehabilitation,
Diplomats Here Say.
By. WILLIAM HARD.

disaster in Japan brings forward
/ a new phase in the relations be-
tween Japan and the United States
and a new phase in the whole
politics of the region of the Pacific.
For some little time now to come
the thoughts of japan will be
turned inward rather than outward.
Her energies will be consumed on
domestic rather than on foreign
problems.
Her tendency lately-as it hap.
pens-has- been. in fact, toward Z
considerable withdrawal from for
eign adventures. This tendency
will now be much emphasized.
Such is the opinion found here in
Japanese circles as well as among
American onlookers.
Worse Than War Blow.
japan has suffered blow. it is
argued, which is heavier than any
blow she has received in war since
her entrance into the modern inter.
national world. In lives and in
property, in men and in capital.
Japan is harder hit by this
cataclysm Of nature than she was
by the Russo-Japanese war.
Japan now has a terrific ''deyas-
tated region" with nobody from
whom to collect Preparations"
Her intact resources, Government
tai as we'll as private, will be
stretched to repair that devasta-
ton and to restore within japan
the full necessary basis Of japanese
prosperity.
During such a period the Japa-
nese Empire may have foreign af-
fairs thrust upon it: and 1t will Of
course continue to be \ working
part of existing international rela-
tionships and situations:' but 1t will
be finding its special national calls
to special national sacrifices at
home rather than abroad.
Such seemed to be the prospect
in the mind of the japanese Am
hassador Hanihara in conversation
here today.
Foreign affairs cannot cease.
said Ambassador Hanlharn. but
Japan now has an inward task OF
colossal and engrossing magnitude.
He had not yet heard one word
directly as to the fate of any of his
friends in Japan. Nor had Sadao
Saburi, the embassy counselor.
Being japanese, they were polite
ly keeping their feelings to them.
selves. It is appreciated here in the
Japanese that they do not weep for
themselves-at least, in public.
Gratitude to America.
Their gratitude, however. to the
American Government and people
for the prompt response or the
American heart to Japanese suffer
ing was openly and freely shown.
1t is thankfully noted here. both
in the Japanese embassy and in the
State Department. that no outbreak
ing encounters between japanese
diplomacy and American diplomacy
in Far Eastern affairs are any longer
in existence to embarrass either the
giving or the receiving Of American
courtesies and generosities at this
moment.
In the State Department this
writer is informed that japanese
behavior in the Far East in pur-
suance of the agreements reached in
the Washington conference of 1921
and 1922 has left no diplomatic issue
between the two countries in that
part Of the world.
so far as diplomatic difficulties
are concerned, Tokyo has furnished
us with none of them for a long
time" said a State Department Of
fetal today.
New Spirit in Relations.
In such circumstances it is be-
lieved that the present outpouring
of American official and unofficial
sympathy to japan may be the occa.
sion for the final fixing of a new
spirit in American Japanese rela-
tons.
1t is certain that it is now being
noted that japan recently has dis
played an international tendency dis.
tinctly in harmony with American
hopes.
Her troops now hold no positions
on the Asiatic mainland except i'm
Manchuria in the Liaotung PENN
sula and along the rightof-way of
the Manchurian railroad.
The Japanese holdings today out
side Japan are smaller than the
holdings of the United States out
side the United States.
The soldiers of the Rising Sun
have allowed that sun to set on the
Japanese adventures in Shantung
and at Hankow and in continental
Siberia.
Today the sun Of Japan is ris-
ing on a scene of Japanese en-
deavor to rebuild a great stretch
of the Japanese empire out OF
ruins within Japan.
II is regarded here as a dramatic
fact that this summons to heroic
patriotism comes precisely at a
moment when powerful elements in
Japan have been making great
strides toward persuading their fell
low-countrymen to seek their ma
tional fortunes less by action and
more by peaceful industrial effort.
Fate Against MiIitarists.
The hand of impersonal fate now
has interviewed in Japan on the
side of the peace party and against
the military party. Japan now
sees before her one of the greatest
and most absorbing and exhausting
tasks of peaceful reconstruction
ever set before country IL
modern times.
This task will determine the tone
Of Japan for many years to come.
Meanwhile the tone of America
| toward Japan had already been
considerably changed by Japan s
new diplomacy.
It now, 1t is thought, will be still
further, changed in the same di-
rection by the great and pitiful