1
The realities of American policy in China and toward China are going
to be more seriously tested in the future than they ever have been in
the past. Japanese papers have been full of protests against any
attempt by the Pacific Conference to place Japan on trial. Would that
American journals were full of warnings that America is on trial at
the Conference as to the sincerity and intelligent goodwill behind her
amiable professions. The world will not stop with the Pacific
Conference; the latter, however important, will not arrest future
developments, and the United States will continue to be on trial till
she has established by her acts a permanent and definite attitude. For
the realities of the situation cannot be exhausted in any formula or
in any set of diplomatic agreements, even if the Conference confounds
the fears of pessimists and results in a harmonious union of the
powers in support of China's legitimate aspirations for free political
and economic growth.
The Conference, however, stands as a symbol of the larger situation;
and its decisions or lack of them will be a considerable factor in the
determination of subsequent events. Sometimes one is obliged to fall
back on a trite phrase. We are genuinely at a parting of the ways.
Even if we should follow in our old path, there would none the less be
a parting of the ways, for we cannot consistently tread the old path
unless we are animated by a much more conscious purpose and a more
general and intelligent knowledge of affairs than have controlled our
activities in the past.
The ideas expressed by an English correspondent about the fear that
America is soon to be an active source of danger in the Far East are
not confined to persons on foreign shores. The prevailing attitude in
some circles of American opinion is that called by President Hibben
cynical pessimism. All professed radicals and many liberals believe
that if our course has been better in the past it has been due to
geographical accidents combined with indifference and with our
undeveloped economic status. Consequently they believe that since we
have now become what is called a world-power and a nation which
exports instead of importing capital, our course will soon be as bad
as that of any of the rest of them. In some quarters this opinion is
clearly an emotional reaction following the disillusionments of
Versailles. In others, it is due to adherence to a formula: nothing in
international affairs can come out of capitalism and America is
emphatically a capitalistic country. Whether or not these feelings are
correct, they are not discussable; neither an emotion nor an absolute
formula is subject to analysis.
But there are specific elements in the situation which give grounds
for apprehension as to the future. These specific elements are capable
of detection and analysis. An adequate realization of their nature
will be a large factor in preventing cynical apprehensions from
becoming actual. This chapter is an attempt at a preliminary listing,
inadequate, of course, as any preliminary examination must be. While
an a priori argument based on a fatalistic formula as to how a
"capitalistic nation" must conduct itself does not appeal to me, there
are nevertheless concrete facts which are suggested by that formula.
Part of our comparatively better course in China in the past is due to
the fact that we have not had the continuous and close alliance
between the State Department and big banking interests which is found
in the case of foreign powers. No honest well-informed history of
developments in China could be written in which the Russian Asiatic
Bank, the Foreign Bank of Belgium, the French Indo-China Bank and
Banque Industrielle, the Yokohama Specie Bank, the Hongkong-Shanghai
Bank, etc., did not figure prominently. These banks work in the
closest harmony, not only with railway and construction syndicates and
big manufacturing interests at home, but also with their respective
foreign offices. It is hardly too much to say that legations and banks
have been in most important matters the right and left hands of the
same body. American business interests have complained an the past
that the American government does not give to American traders abroad
the same support that the nationals of other states receive. In the
past these complaints have centred largely about actual wrongs
suffered or believed to have been suffered by American business
undertakings carried on in a foreign country. With the present
expansion of capital and of commerce, the same complaints and demands
are going to be made not with reference to grievances suffered, but
with reference to furthering, to pushing American commercial interests
in connection with large banking groups. It would take a credulous
person to deny the influence of big business in domestic politics. As
we become more interested in commerce and banking enterprises what
assurance have we that the alliance will not be transferred to
international politics?
It should be noted that the policy of the open door as affirmed by the
great powers--and as frequently violated by them--even if it be
henceforth observed in good faith, does not adequately protect us from
this danger. The open door policy is not primarily a policy about
China herself but rather about the policies of foreign powers toward
one another with respect to China. It demands equality of economic
opportunity for different nations. Were it enforced, it would prevent
the granting of monopolies to any one nation: there is nothing in it
to render impossible a conjoint exploitation of China by foreign
powers, an organized monopoly in which each nation has its due share
with respect to others. Such an organization might conceivably reduce
friction among the great powers, and thereby reduce the danger of
future wars--as long as China herself is impotent to go to war. The
agreement might conceivably for a considerable time be of benefit to
China herself. But it is clear that for the United States to become a
partner in any such arrangement would involve a reversal of our
historic policy in the Far East. It might be technically consistent
with the open door policy, but it would be a violation of the larger
sense in which the American people has understood and praised that
ideal. He is blind who does not see that there are forces making for
such a reversal. And since we are all more or less blind, an opening
of our eyes to the danger is one of the conditions of its not being
realized.
One of the forces which is operative is indicated by the phrase that
an international agreement on an economic and financial basis might be
of value to China herself. The mere suggestion that such a thing is
possible is abhorrent to many, especially to radicals. There seems to
be something sinister in it. So it is worth explaining how and why it
might be so. In the first place, it would obviously terminate the
particularistic grabbing for "leased" territory, concessions and
spheres of influence which has so damaged China. At the present time,
the point of this remark lies in its implied reference to Japan, as at
one time it might have applied to Russia. Fear of Japan's aims in
China is not confined to China; the fear is widespread. An
international economic arrangement may therefore be plausibly
presented as the easiest and most direct method of relieving China of
the Japanese menace. For Japan to stay out would be to give herself
away; if she came in, it would subject Japanese activities to constant
scrutiny and control. There is no doubt that part of the fear of Japan
regarding the Pacific Conference is due to a belief that some such
arrangement is contemplated. The case is easily capable of such
presentation as to make it appeal to Americans who are really friendly
to China and who haven't the remotest interest in her economic
exploitation.
The arrangement would, for example, automatically eliminate the
Lansing-Ishii agreement with its embarrassing ambiguous recognition of
Japan's _special_ interests in China.
The other factor is domestic. The distraction and civil wars of China
are commonplaces. So is the power exercised by the military governors
and generals. The greater one's knowledge, the more one perceives how
intimately the former evil is dependent upon the latter. The financial
plight of the Chinese government, its continual foreign borrowings
which threaten bankruptcy in the near future, depend upon militaristic
domination and wild expenditure for unproductive purposes and squeeze.
Without this expense, China would have no great difficulty henceforth
in maintaining a balance in her budget. The retardation of public
education whose advancement--especially in elementary schools--is
China's greatest single need is due to the same cause. So is the
growth in official corruption which is rapidly extending into business
and private life.
In fact, every one of the obstacles to the progress of China is
connected with the rule of military factions and their struggles with
one another for complete mastery. An economic international agreement
among the great powers can be made which would surely reduce and
possibly eliminate the greatest evils of "militarism." Many liberal
Chinese say in private that they would be willing to have a temporary
international receivership for government finance, provided they could
be assured of its nature and the exact date and conditions of its
termination--a proviso which they are sensible enough to recognize
would be extremely difficult of attainment. American leadership in
forming and executing any such scheme would, they feel, afford the
best reassurance as to its nature and terms. Under such circumstances
a plausible case can be made out for proposals which, under the guise
of traditional American friendship for China, would in fact commit us
to a reversal of our historic policy.
There are radicals abroad and at home who think that our entrance into
a Consortium already proves that we have entered upon the road of
reversal and who naturally see in the Pacific Conference the next
logical step. I have previously stated my own belief that our State
Department proposed the Consortium primarily for political ends, as a
means of checking the policy pursued by Japan of making unproductive
loans to China in return for which she was getting an immediate grip
on China's natural resources and preparing the way for direct
administrative and financial control when the day of reckoning and
foreclosure should finally come. I also said that the Consortium was
between two stools, the financial and the political and that up to the
present its chief value had been negative and preventive, and that
jealousy or lack of interest by Japan and Great Britain in any
constructive policy on the part of the Consortium was likely to
maintain the same condition. I have seen no reason thus far to change
my mind on this point, nor in regard to the further belief that
probably the interests of China in the end will be best served by the
continuation of this deterrent function. But the question is bound to
arise: why continue the Consortium if it isn't doing anything? The
pressure of foreign powers interested in the exploitation of China and
of impatient American economic interests may combine to put an end to
the present rather otiose existence led by the Consortium. The two
stools between which the past action of the American government has
managed to swing the Consortium may be united to form a single solid
bench.
At the risk of being charged with credulous gullibility, or something
worse, I add that up to the present time the American phase of the
Consortium hasn't shown perceptible signs of becoming a club exercised
by American finance over China's economic integrity and independence.
I believe the repeated statements of the American representative that
he himself and the interests he represents would be glad if China
proved her ability to finance her own public utilities without
resorting to foreign loans. This belief is confirmed by the first
public utterance of the new American minister to China who in his
reference to the Consortium laid emphasis upon its deterrent function
and upon the stimulation it has given to Chinese bankers to finance
public utilities. And it is the merest justice to Mr. Stevens, the
American representative, to say that he represents the conservative
investment type of banker, not the "promotion" type, and that thus far
his great concern has been the problem of protecting the buyer of such
securities as are passed on by the banks to the ultimate investor--so
much so that he has aroused criticism from American business interests
impatient for speedy action. But there is a larger phase of the
Consortium concerning which I think apprehensions may reasonably be
entertained.
Suppose, if merely by way of hypothesis, that the American government
is genuinely interested in China and in making the policy of the open
door and Chinese territorial and administrative integrity a reality,
not merely a name, and suppose that it is interested in doing so from
an American self-interest sufficiently enlightened to perceive that
the political and economic advancement of the United States is best
furthered by a policy which is identical with China's ability to
develop herself freely and independently: what then would be the wise
American course? In short, it would be to view our existing European
interests and issues (due to the war) and our Far Eastern interests
and issues as parts of one and the same problem. If we are actuated by
the motive hypothetically imputed to our government and we fail in its
realization, the chief reason will be that we regard the European
question and the Asiatic problem as two different questions, or
because we identify them from the wrong end.
Our present financial interest in Europe is enormous. It involves not
merely foreign governmental loans but a multitude of private advances
and commitments. These financial entanglements affect not merely our
industry and commerce but our politics. They involve much more
immediately pressing concerns than to our Asiatic relations, and they
involve billions where the latter involve millions. The danger under
such conditions that our Asiatic relations will be sacrificed to our
European is hardly fanciful.
To make this abstract statement concrete, the firm of bankers, J. P.
Morgan & Co., which is most heavily involved in European indebtedness
to the United States, is the firm which is the leading spirit in the
Consortium for China. It seems almost inevitable that the Asiatic
problem should look like small potatoes in comparison with the
European one, especially as our own industrial recuperation is so
closely connected with European relations, while the Far East cuts a
negligible figure. To my mind the real danger to set out upon selfish
exploitation of China: intelligent self-interest, tradition and the
fact that our chief asset in China is our past freedom from a
predatory course, dictate a course of cooperation with China. The
danger is that China will be subordinated and sacrificed because of
primary preoccupation with the high finance and politics of Europe,
that she will be lost in the shuffle.
The European aspect of the problem can be made more concrete by
reference to Great Britain in particular. That country suffers from
the embarrassment of the Japanese alliance. She has already made it
sufficiently clear that she would like to draw America into the
alliance, making it tripartite, since that would be the easiest way of
maintaining good relations with both Japan and the United States.
There is no likelihood that any such step will be consummated. But
British diplomacy is experienced and astute. And by force of
circumstances our high finance has contracted a sort of economic
alliance with Great Britain. There is no wish to claim superior virtue
for America or to appeal to the strong current of anti-British
sentiment. But the British foreign office exists and operates apart
from the tradition of liberalism which has mainly actuated English
domestic politics. It stands peculiarly for the _Empire_ side of the
British Empire, no matter what party is in the saddle in domestic
affairs. Every resource will be employed to bring about a settlement
at the Pacific Conference which, even though it includes some degree
of compromise on the part of Great Britain, will bend the Asiatic
policy of the United States to the British traditions in the Far East,
instead of committing Great Britain to combining with the United
States in making a reality of the integrity of China to which both
countries are nominally committed. It does not seem an extreme
statement to say that the immediate issues of the Conference depend
upon the way in which our financial commitments in Europe are treated,
either as reasons for our making concessions to European policy or on
the other hand as a means of securing an adherence of the European
powers to the traditional American policy.
A publicist in China who is of British origin and a sincere friend of
China remarked in private conversation that if the United States could
not secure the adherence of Great Britain to her Asiatic policy by
persuasion (he was deploring the Japanese alliance) she might do so by
buying it--through remission of her national debt to us. It is not
necessary to resort to the measure so baldly suggested. But the remark
at least suggests that our involvement in European, especially
British, finance and politics may be treated in either of two ways for
either of two results.
2
That the Chinese people generally speaking has a less antagonistic
feeling toward the United States than towards other powers seems to me
an undoubted fact. The feeling has been disturbed at divers times by
the treatment of the Chinese upon the Pacific coast, by the exclusion
act, by the turning over of our interest in the building of the
Peking-Canton (or Hankow) railway to a European group, by the
Lansing-Ishii agreement, and finally by the part played by President
Wilson in the Versailles decision regarding Shantung. Those
disturbances in the main, however, have made them dubious as to our
skill, energy and intelligence rather than as to our good-will.
Americans, taken individually and collectively, are to the Chinese--at
least such was my impression--a rather simple folk, taking the word in
its good and its deprecatory sense. In noting the Chinese reaction to
the proposed Pacific Conference, it was interesting to see the
combination of an almost unlimited hope that the United States was to
lead in protecting them from further aggressions and in rectifying
existing evils, with a lack of confidence, a fear that the United
States would have something put over on it.
Friendly feeling is of course mainly based upon a negative fact, the
fact that the United States has taken no part in "leasing"
territories, establishing spheres and setting up extra-national
post-offices. On the positive side stands the contribution made by
Americans to education, especially medical, and that of girls and
women, and to philanthropy and relief. Politically, there are the
early service of Burlinghame, the open door policy of John Hay (though
failure to maintain it in fact while securing signatures to it on
paper is a considerable part of the Chinese belief in our defective
energy) and the part played by the United States in moderating the
terms of the settlement of the Boxer outbreak, in addition to a
considerable number of minor helpful acts. China also remembers that
we were the only nation to take exception to the treaties embodying
the Twenty-one Demands. While our exception was chiefly made on the
basis of our own interests which these treaties might injuriously
affect, a sentiment exists that the protest was a pledge of assistance
to China when the time should be opportune for raising the whole
question. And without doubt the reservation made on May 16, 1915, by
our State Department is a strong card at the forthcoming Conference if
the Department wishes to play it.
From an American standpoint, the open door principle represents one of
the only two established principles of American diplomacy, the other
being, of course, the Monroe Doctrine. In connection with sentimental
or idealistic associations which have clustered about it, it
constitutes us in some vague fashion in both the Chinese and American
public opinion a sort of guardian or at least spokesman of the
interests of China in relation to foreign powers. Although, as was
pointed out in a former chapter, the open door policy directly
concerns other nations in their relation to China rather than China
herself, yet the violation of the policy by other powers has been so
frequent and so much to the detriment of China, that American
interest, prestige and moral sentiment are now implicated in such an
enforcement of it as will redound to the advantage of China.
Citizens of other countries are often irritated by a suggestion of
such a relationship between the United States and China. It presents
itself as a proclamation of superior national virtue under cover of
which the United States aims to establish its influence in China at
the expense of other countries. The irritation is exasperated by the
fact that the situation as it stands is an undoubted economic and
political asset of the United States in China. We may concede without
argument any contention that the situation is not due to any superior
virtue but rather to contingencies of history and geography--in which
respect it is not unlike many things that pass for virtues with
individuals. The contention may be admitted without controversy
because it is not pertinent to the main issue. The question is not so
much how the state of affairs came about as what it now is, how it is
to be treated and what consequences are in flow from it. It is a fact
that up to the present an intelligent self-interest of America has
coincided with the interests of a stable, independent and progressive
China. It is also a fact that American traditions and sentiments have
gathered about this consideration so that now there is widespread
conviction in the American people of moral obligations of assistance
and friendly protection owed by us to China. At present, no policy can
be entered upon that does not bear the semblance of fairness and
goodwill. We have at least so much protection against the dangers
discussed in the prior chapter.
Among Americans in China and presumably at home there is a strong
feeling that we should adopt for the future stronger and more positive
policies than we have maintained in the past. This feeling seems to me
fraught with dangers unless we make very clear to ourselves in just
what respects we are to continue and make good in a more positive
manner our traditional policy. To some extent our past policy has been
one of drifting. Radical change in this respect may go further than
appears upon the surface in altering other fundamental aspects of our
policy. What is condemned as drifting is in effect largely the same
thing that is also praised as non-interference. A detailed settled
policy, no matter how "constructive" it may appear to be, can hardly
help involving us in the domestic policies of China, an affair of
factions and a game which the Chinese understand and play much better
than any foreigners. Such an involvement would at once lessen a
present large asset in China, aloofness from internal intrigues and
struggles.
The specific protests of Chinese in this country--mainly
Cantonese--against the Consortium seem to me mainly based on
misapprehension. But their _general_ attitude of opposition
nevertheless conveys an important lesson. It is based on a belief that
the effect of the Consortium will be to give the Peking government a
factitious advantage in the internal conflict which is waging in
China, so that to all intents and purposes it will mark a taking of
sides on our part. It is well remembered that the effect of the
"reorganization" loan of the prior Consortium--in which the United
States was _not_ a partner--was to give Yuan Shi Kai the funds which
seated him and the militarist faction after him, firmly in the
governmental saddle. Viewing the matter from a larger point of view
than that of Canton vs. Peking, the most fundamental objection I heard
brought by Chinese against the Consortium was in effect as follows:
The republican revolution in China has still to be wrought out; the
beginning of ten years ago has been arrested. It remains to fight it
out. The inevitable effect of increased foreign financial and economic
interest in China, even admitting that its industrial effect was
advantageous to China, would be to create an interest in _stabilizing_
China politically, which in effect would mean to sanctify the status
quo, and prevent the development of a revolution which cannot be
accomplished without internal disorders that would affect foreign
investments unfavorably. These considerations are not mentioned for
the sake of throwing light on the Consortium: they are cited as an
illustration of the probability that a too positive and constructive
development of our tradition of goodwill to China would involve us in
an interference with Chinese domestic affairs injurious to China's
welfare, to that free and independent development in which we profess
such interest.
But how, it will be asked, are we to protect China from foreign
depredations, particularly those of Japan, how are we to change our
nominal goodwill into a reality, if we do not enter much more positive
and detailed policies? If there was in existence at the present time
any such thing as a diplomacy of peoples as distinct from a diplomacy
of governments, the question would mean something quite different from
what it now means. As things now stand the people should profoundly
distrust the _politicians'_ love for China. It is too frequently the
reverse side of fear and incipient hatred of Japan, colored perhaps by
anti-British feeling.
There should be no disguising of the situation. The aggressive
activities of other nations in China, centering but not exhausted at
this time in Japan, are not merely sources of trouble to China but
they are potential causes of trouble in our own international
relationships. We are committed by our tradition and by the present
actualities of the situation to attempting something positive for
China as respects her international status, to live up to our
responsibility is a most difficult and delicate matter. We have on the
one side to avoid getting entangled in quasi-imperialistic European
policies in Asia, whether under the guise of altruism, of putting
ourselves in a position where we can exercise a more effective
supervision of their behavior, or by means of economic expansion. On
the other side, we have to avoid drifting into that kind of covert or
avowed antagonism to European and Japanese imperialism which will only
increase friction, encourage a combination especially of Great Britain
and Japan---or of France and Japan--against us, and bring war
appreciably nearer.
We need to bear in mind that China will not be saved from outside
herself. Even if by a successful war we should relieve China from
Japanese encroachments, from all encroachments, China would not of
necessity be brought nearer her legitimate goal of orderly and
prosperous internal development. Apart from the question of how far
war can now settle any fundamental issues without begetting others as
dangerous, China of all countries is the one where settlement by
force, especially by outside force, is least applicable, and most
likely to be enormously disserviceable. China is used to taking time
to deal with her problems: she can neither understand not profit by
impatient methods of the western world which are profoundly alien to
her genius. Moreover a civilization which is on a continental scale,
which is so old that the rest of us are parvenus in comparison, which
is thick and closely woven, cannot be hurried in its development
without disaster. Transformation from within is its sole way out, and
we can best help China by trying to see to it that she gets the time
she needs in order to effect this transformation, whether or not we
like the particular form it assumes at any particular time.
A successful war in behalf of China would leave untouched her problems
of education, of factional and sectional forces, of political
immaturity showing itself in present incapacity for organization. It
would affect her industrial growth undoubtedly, but in all human
probability for the worse, increasing the likelihood that she would
enter upon an industrialization which would repeat the worst evils of
western industrial life, without the immunities, resistances and
remedial measures which the West has evolved. The imagination cannot
conceive a worse crime than fastening western industrialism upon China
before she has developed within herself the meaning of coping with the
forces which it would release. The danger is great enough as it is.
War waged in China's behalf by western powers and western methods
would make the danger practically irresistible. In addition we should
gain a permanent interest in China which is likely to be of the most
dangerous character to ourselves. If we were not committed by it to
future imperialism, we should be luckier than we have any right to
hope to be. These things are said against a mental protest to
admitting even by implication the prospect of war with Japan, but it
seems necessary to say them.
These remarks are negative and vague as to our future course. They
imply a confession of lack of such wisdom as would enable me to make
positive definite proposals. But at least I have confidence in the
wisdom and goodwill of the American and other peoples to deal with the
problem, if they are only called into action. And the first condition
of calling wisdom and goodwill into effective existence is to
recognize the seriousness of the problem and the utter futility of
trying to force its solution by impatient and hurried methods.
Pro-Japanese apologetics is dangerous; it obscures the realities of
the situation. An irritated anti-Japanism that would hasten the
solution of the Chinese problem merely by attacking Japan is equally
fatal to discovering and applying a proper method.
More specifically and also more generically, proper publicity is the
greatest need. If, as Secretary Hughes has intimated, a settlement of
the problems of the Pacific is made a condition of arriving at an
agreement regarding reduction and limitation of armaments, it is
likely that the Conference might better never be held. In eagerness to
do something which will pass as a settlement, either China's--and
Siberia's--interests will be sacrificed in some unfair compromise, or
irritation and friction will be increased--and in the end so will
armaments. In any literal sense, it is ridiculous to suppose that the
problems of the Pacific can be settled in a few weeks, or months--or
years. Yet the discussion of the problems, in separation from the
question of armament, may be of great use. For it may further that
publicity which is a pre-condition of any genuine settlement. This
involves the public in diplomacy. But it also involves a wider
publicity, one which will enlighten the world about the facts of Asia,
internal and international.
Scepticism about Foreign Offices, as they are at present conducted, is
justified. But scepticism about the power of public opinion, if it can
be aroused and instructed, to reshape Foreign Office policies means
hopelessness about the future of the world. Let everything possible be
done to reduce armament, if only to secure a naval holiday on the part
of the three great naval powers, and if only for the sake of lessening
taxation. Let the Conference on Problems devote itself to discussing
and making known as fully and widely as possible the element and scope
of those problems, and the fears--or should one call them hopes?--of
the cynics will be frustrated. It is not so important that a decision
in the American sense of the Yap question be finally and forever
arrived at, as it is that the need of China and the Orient in general
for freer and fuller communications with the rest of the world be made
clear--and so on, down or up the list of agenda. The commercial open
door is needed. But the need is greater that the door be opened to
light, to knowledge and understanding. If these forces will not create
a public opinion which will in time secure a lasting and just
settlement of other problems, there is no recourse save despair of
civilization. Liberals can do something better than predicting failure
and impugning motives. They can work for the opened door of open
diplomacy, of continuous and intelligent inquiry, of discussion free
from propaganda. To shirk this responsibility on the alleged ground
that economic imperialism and organized greed will surely bring the
Conference to failure is supine and snobbish. It is one of the factors
that may lead the United States to take the wrong course in the
parting of the ways.
October, 1921.