The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1932-01-29
U. S. BOYCOTT
VIEWED FATAL
TO JAPANESE
Nippon Could Not Live Six
Months Walsh Declares;
Arms Ban Urged.

By United Press
WASHINGTON, Jan. 29.-Belief
that Japan could not survive for
six months in an economic war
with the United States was ex-
pressed today by Senator Thomas
j. Walsh Dem, Month, a member
of the senate foreign relations
committee.
No one in the senate is predict
ing war of any kind between the
United States and Japan, but Jap
anese policies in China have
focused attention on the poten-
tialitieS Of the oriental situation.
Chairman Frederick Hale of the
senate naval affairs committee, who
participated in the futile fight to
defeat the London naval treaty in
1880, said today that the Chinese
japanese situation warranted
prompt action on pending naval
construction legislation.
4 shall explain the comparative
naval situation in speech in the
senate next week." he said.
Arms Export Ban Urged
Senator Clarence Dill Dem.
Wash) told the United Press he
would ask the foreign relations
committee Wednesday to act on his
resolution forbidding export of arms
or munitions to Japan or China.
A dozen senators have assured
Dill they will support his measure,
and there are indications of rap
idly increasing sentiment for such
a prohibition.
Walsh expressed the opinion that
the United States holds Japan al
most in an economic wise. He esti-
mated Japanese sales of silk and tea
to this country aggregated $3.50 000,-
600 a year, and said the proceeds
were used to import food into Ja-
pan.
There has been talk" he said,' of
operating our fleet against Japan in
the far eastern water or whether,
if Japan seized the Philippines, we
could regain them.
Boycott Viewed Deadly"
Il do not believe the people of
the United States would go to war
to regain the Philippines. If war
should eventuate from the Situa-
ton in the Orient I do not believe
it would be necessary for the
United States to fire a single shot.
Japan could not survive an Ameri-
can economic boycott for six
months. Her tea and silk are not
essentials for us.
Il am not in position to judge
whether an economic boycott is
warranted or desirable at this time.
1t would be a two-edged sword.
Japan could cut off most of our
trade with China with her fleet"
Dill said today that there had
been no material shipments of
munitions to the Orient so far, and
that his resolution was designed
primarily to cope with a condition
which might arise if the Chinese
Japanese trouble eventually in
volved Soviet Russia.
Munitions Sales Deplored
If Japan should carry her pol
icy into Mongolia" he said, land
thus cut communications into So
Wet Russia, there would be war be-
tween Moscow and Toxic next sum-
mer, and Japan would have to inn
port vast quantities of munitions.
IF we allow our munitions maxi
ers to sell either country they i'm
nediately will have a financial in
tereSt in that struggle.
There is another fact we should
keep in mind. The United States
has vast interests in the Pacific. We
must protect them.
While we desire to avoid trouble
with all other countries, it is we'll
to remember that with conditions
as they are, it is not to our inter-
est to furnish munitions of war to
any nation in that part of the
world"