Evening star., 1925-09-07
BY FRANK PRICE BELL,

Correspondence of The Star and the Chicago
MANILA.-"You want complete and
immediate independence for the Philip
pines?" / remarked To President
Manuel L. Quezon of the Philippine
Senate, perhaps the most influential
Filipino leader at the present time.
Yes" was the reply.
You. see no danger to the Philip
pines or the peace of the Pacific and
the world in a withdrawal of the
and its waters?"
None. On the contrary, I think
untrammeled statehood for the Philip
pines would reinforce peace influences
in the Pacific and elsewhere"
You should expect no aggression
against the islands from any source?''
Not from any source. When peo-
pie talk about warlike movements
against a free Philippines, they have
in mind just one nation. They do
not mean Russia or China or France
or England. They mean Japan. Let
us, therefore, consider the question of
what Japan might be expected to do
if the Philippines were liberated and
left TO their own resources. I will
say at once that Japan, in my opinion,
would not dream of any hostile act
toward us, and I will explain why
think so.
Japan's Peaceful Purposes.
I'm the first place, I believe Japan
to be non-aggressive. 1 believe both
her heart and her mind urge her to
international peace. / am convinced
she sees no profit, only universal dis
aster, in war. Japan will fight, If
understand her, only to preserve her
national security and to defend those
rights and interests which seem to her
indispensable to her liberty and life.
Such rights and interests do not
beckon her far afield; they lie within
the circumference of her natural and
legitimate position in the Far East.
But, for the sake of argument, let
us suppose that Japan is not peaceful,
but warlike. Even then the Philip
pines would be of very little use, if
any, to her unless she contemplated
hostile operations against the United
States or Australia, and every student
of Japanese feeling, thought and policy
knows she contemplates no such
thing. Were it otherwise, were her in
sttncts and ambitions really running
in the direction of expansion by con-
quest-how could she embark upon
such a course? Let us indulge in the
fantastic conjecture that she desires
United States.
Would Be Poor Base.
Let us forget the frightful devas-
tation of the earthquake of 1923. Let
us forget Japan'S financial, industrial
and social difficulties and the burdens
that closely contiguous foreign prob
lens place upon her craftsmanship.
Let us put all things out of mind
A.
pire wants to go to war with the
American republic, the richest and
most powerful country in the world.
Japan could not strike from the Phil
fppines; at the very least she would
need Hawaii, and who does not realize
that even so her enterprise would be
desperate? The thought that Japan
may some day want to attack the
United States is to every sane mind
too preposterous for even hypothetical
discussion.
LAS for Australia, Japan knows that
any war or attack upon that country
would raise against heron the in
slant and with all their wealth, arma-
ment and indomitable fighting spirit
the combined nations of the Anglo
Saxon world.
Very well, then. If Japan does
not want the Philippines as a STEP
ping-Stone to conquest, would she
want these islands as a defensive
base? 1 can conceive of no principle
of strategy that would cause her to
covet them for such a purpose. 1t
is obvious, indeed, that possession of
the Philippines would be a source of
weakness, not of strength, to the
Japanese, if they were attacked.
They have Formosa and Formosa is
in the right line for their defense
and nearer home. If Japan were at
tackled, she would not scatter her
forces; she would concentrate them
If she had naval craft in Philippine
waters, she quickly would withdraw
them to the support of her main fleet.
Sees British Assistance.
"If the United States removed it's
authority and its fighting forces from
the Philippines, neither Japan nor
any other power would molest US. If
Japan moved against US, whether
America did or did not call upon her
to halt, Britain would call upon her
TO halt and compel her to halt. Aus
tralia's cry easily would reach to
Downing street and it would be aug
mented by the cry of every British
possession in Asia. Britain would
threaten Japan, not. from British
home waters, but from Singapore and
Hongkong. and if Japan had naval or
military contingents here or on their
way hither she speedily would recall
them to her vital defensive lines.
Surveying the whole horizon of pos
sibilities, 1 can discern no presage
of an attempted seizure of this archi-
pelago as a result of an American
withdrawal.
ION the economic side also there is
an utter absence of incentive to Japan
to incur the reprobation of the world
by interfering with the freedom of
the Philippines. Japan does not
want the Philippines for her people.
The Japanese are not a tropical
people.
"They are a people of the temperate
zones. Their whole organic and tenn
peramental adaptation is to a climate
different from that of our latitude.
If they do not like weather too cold
as they do not-neither do they like
the meteorology of the tropics. Japa-
neSe die here in great numbers. We
once had some $4,000. They came to
work in the hemp fields. Probably
not more than 5000 are left. In all
the centuries of the past, before Spain
came, during her $50 years here and
since she went away, no considerable
body of Japanese ever availed itself of
its liberty to enter the Philippines at
its own will
Discounts Immigration.
'why, then, anticipate at this time
an emigratory flood of Japanese in
this direction? They will not come
Nor has Japan anything to gain by
seeking a preferential industrial or
commercial position in the Philip
pines. Efforts of that kind would run
directly counter to her interests, and
she knows 1T, for Japan has an en-
lightened peonle and leadership in