Evening star., 1937-07-02
War on the Amur?

Although the RuSSO-JapaneSe border
imbroglio on the Amur has not yet led
to largescale hostlities, the incident"
contains in plenty the ingredients OF
war. While the Moscow and Toxic gov
ernments hold each other responsible
for the dispute and are negotiating for
settlement, Soviet and Japanese mill
tary, naval and air forces are massing
on their respective sides of the river
amid every indication that a clash is
anticipated. With recriminating charges
OF aggression" and Invasion" and off,
clal japanese description of the situa-
ton as very strained it is evident that
the Far East is once again perilously
close to an explosion between the two
great powers with conflicting ambitions
for Asiatic supremacy.
The crisis broke out with disconcert-
ing suddenness. Foreign Commissar
Litvinoff and Japanese Ambassador
Shigemitsu had just agreed upon with
drawal of Russian forces from disputed
Amur islands when, according to the Jap
anese,> three Soviet gunboats entered the
channel between Sennufa Island and the
Manchukuoan shore and fired on Japa-
nese soldiers swimming in the river.
japanese Manchukuoan batteries retail
ated, repeatedly sinking one Soviet gun
boat, seriously damaging another and
causing the third vessel to retreat. Soviet
authorities claim the trouble was started
by Japanese Se-Manchukuoan cutters at
tack on Russian post and gunboat, re-
sulting in the killing of two of the lat
ter's crew. Japan has demanded that
the Soviet forthwith evacuate all its
troops from Amur islands, intimating
That severe consequences will follow re-
fusal to do so. There the purely diplo-
matte aspect of the controversy rests.
While charges and counter charges
rage respecting origin of the affair, spec
ulation is rife as to what motives ac-
tually inspire each country to permit
"a couple of economically, worthless
marshy islets" to provoke the long
threatened Soviet-Japanese duel. Are
Stain and his confreres tempted to VEN
ture a gigantic war gamble as the best
means OF rallying the Russian people
and quelling the disorganization and
revolt so glaringly revealed by whole
sale military and civilian purges? BY
such remote patriotic "diversion" does
the Kremlin perhaps hope to distract
the country's attention from dissension
and chaos? Is it possible that the red
army in the Far East has gotten out of
hand and run amuck, regardless of
Moscow?
IT these are considerations suggesting
what may animate the Soviet course,
what may be the impulses at work on
the Japanese side? Are there military
hotspurs on the Amur as disdainful of
restraint from Toxic as the Kwantung
army leaders who took matters into
their own hands at Mukden in 1881 and
exploited relatively trifling railroad
incident that was to end in the estab-
hshment OF puppet Manchukuo? Or
does Japan again envision a west, pre-
occupied six years ago with depression,
now SO absorbed in other problems-the
French financial upheaval, European
differences growing out of the Spanish
conflict, Russia's industrial and military
dlslocatlon-that Nippon has another
fortuitous opportunity to sally forth on
territorial expansion adventure at
minimum risk?
Whatever the prologue, the Far East
ern stage once more seems ominously
set for that tragedy on which the world
has almost Realistically waited for the
curtain to rise.