JAPANESE METHODS AND ALLIED FAR-EASTERN POLICY
The Japanese, for their own peculiar reasons, as will have already
appeared, had decided in the early stages of the operations that the
maritime provinces were their special preserve. They looked with the
greatest suspicion upon the forces and efforts of the other Allies,
especially British and American, and by their orders tried deliberately
to exclude them from their counsels and as far as possible from the
administration of the territory recovered from the Terrorists. The 27th
Battalion of American Infantry had landed at Vladivostok a few days
before the battle of Dukoveskoie, and promises were made that they
should be hurried forward to take a share in the fighting; but the
Japanese, who controlled the railway, saw to it that they arrived a day
late. Instead of pushing them ahead, they were detrained at Svagena, and
then entrained again from day to day, always about fifty versts behind
the Japanese front. In addition the Japanese never trusted their Allies.
No order to the Japanese Army was ever given to the Allied commanders
until the operation had been carried out or had got to such a stage as
to make it impossible for them to take part or offer suggestions.
Captain Stephan (now Major), of the Czech Army, and myself knew every
road and track from Shmakovka to Svagena, and were certain that with
proper care the whole enemy force on the Ussurie front could have been
destroyed or captured. The Japanese would neither consult nor inform any
of their Allies about any movement until it had taken place. They
treated the Czech commanders with the most scant courtesy; the English
officers' carriages were invaded by their private soldiers, who would
insolently ask what business we had in Siberia and when did we propose
to go home; but they reserved their most supreme contempt for the
Russian people. These poor wretches they drove off the railway
platforms, using the butts of their rifles upon the women as well as the
men, just as though they were dealing with a tribe of conquered
Hottentots. I did not understand this behaviour on the part of our
Eastern Ally, and felt it could only be the irresponsible bullying of a
few individual men and officers. Later on I found it to be the general
policy of the Japanese Army to treat everybody as inferior to
themselves; they had learnt this Hun lesson to a nicety.
I give two instances which are neither glaring nor isolated, but of
which no doubt official record remains. I was standing on Nikolsk
platform waiting for a train; there was a crowd of Russian people, and a
Japanese sentry was standing near. This man quite suddenly darted
forward and jammed the butt of his rifle in the centre of a Russian
officer's back; the force of the blow knocked him flat on the floor in
such pain that he rolled about for a few minutes, while the Jap,
grinning, held his bayonet at the "On guard!" Though there were many
standing near, not one Russian had the pluck to shoot him, and not
wishing to mix myself up in the affair, I took no action, but watched
further developments. Ten minutes later another Jap sentry repeated the
performance, but this time the victim was a well-dressed Russian lady.
So cowed were the Russian people that even her friends were afraid to
help her. I stepped forward to offer assistance, with the Jap standing
over me; when, however, he saw my revolver he put up his bayonet, but
continued to laugh as though it was a huge joke. A few Tommies were
attracted to the spot, and the Jap saw that things were beginning to
take a serious turn. I proceeded to the Japanese Headquarters, situated
in a carriage near by, and reported the occurrence. The officer seemed
astonished that I should interfere on behalf of mere Russians, who he
said may have been Bolsheviks for all he knew, and inquired whether the
sentry had ever treated me so. I answered that "the first Japanese that
touches an English officer or soldier in my presence will be a dead
man." This seemed to surprise the Japanese officer, who pointed out that
the Japanese were in occupation of Siberia, and were entitled to do what
they liked. I had to inform him that the Japanese were acting in
alliance with the other Powers, including Russia; that we were here as
the friends of the Russian people, and not as their conquerors. This he
would or could not understand. I ended the interview by warning him that
if his sentries were not instructed to behave a little less like
savages, there would be an end to those sentries' careers. I later
heard that the interview did good, but could not in the case of Japanese
troops do more than slightly mitigate their behaviour to the defenceless
Russian inhabitants.
That is merely a type of their conduct towards ordinary people. There
is, however, one excuse for them: given the right circumstances, they
treat all alike. A battalion commander was not quite the sort of
material to operate upon, for the simple reason that he was usually
surrounded with sufficient force to secure proper respect, but a general
without a powerful escort was always fair sport for their gentle
attentions. Not even the chief of the British Military Mission could
hope to escape from the most insulting behaviour. An incident placed my
unit in charge of a part of the telegraph system, which enabled me to
handle personally the sort of message which entered the Japanese
Headquarters relative to a special train that was approaching their
station. I handled the message myself. It ran as follows:
"A special train, No. ........., will enter your section at .........
time; it conveys the chief of the British Military Mission, General
........., and Staff from Vladivostok to Ufa for important conference
with General Surovey, the Commander-in-Chief of the Czech and Russian
Armies. You will please give 'line clear' throughout the journey." Did
the Japanese give "line clear" throughout? That will never be the way
that this highly efficient and interesting little people will do
anything, if their army is a sample of the whole. They stopped the
train, and boarded it with a squad of men with fixed bayonets. They
insulted the chief of the British Mission by placing him and his Staff
under arrest, and then proceeded to make elaborate inquiries to find out
whether they were not German emissaries in disguise. The impudence of
the whole proceeding was so remarkable and yet characteristic that when
the Staff of the General reported the occurrence to me I did not for a
moment know whether I should die with rage or laughter.
I went to Siberia entirely biassed in favour of this admittedly
wonderful people. I took care to instruct my soldiers to salute every
Japanese officer and to be most polite to every Japanese soldier, and
they carried out my instructions to the letter; but my attention was
called to the fact that only on rare occasions did a Japanese officer
take the trouble to return the salute of my men, and still more rarely
did a Japanese soldier salute an English officer. He was much more
likely to give an insulting grimace. I say quite frankly that I admire
the workmanlike way the Japanese go about their soldierly duties, but it
is impossible to ignore their stupidly studied arrogance towards those
who are anxious to be on terms of peace and amity with them. It is
unfortunately true that they were misled into believing that Germany was
ordained to dominate the world, and, believing this, they shaped their
conduct upon this awful example. They quite openly boast that they are
the Germans of the East. Let us hope that they will read aright the
recent lesson of history.
During my stay in the maritime provinces I never saw or heard of a
single act or order from the Japanese Headquarters which would help in
the slightest degree in the administrative reorganisation of the
country. On the contrary I saw many things which convinced me that the
Land of the Rising Sun was at that time more concerned in maintaining
disorder as the surest way of fostering her own ambitious designs.
At this stage the other Allies were without a Far-Eastern policy. Their
sole object was to push back as far as possible the German-Magyar
forces, which were carrying out the sinister policy of Teutonic
penetration under the guise of Bolshevism. Bolshevism in the Far East at
this date was an attempt to reduce to a system the operations of the
Chinese robber bands of the Mongolian border. Mixed with and led by
released German and Magyar prisoners of war, they became a formidable
force for destroying all attempts at order in Russia and resisting the
possible reconstruction of the Russian front against the Central Powers.
Previous to the Bolshevist régime these Chinese bands had lived by
murder and loot; it was their trade, though hitherto considered illegal,
and sometimes severely punished. No wonder they joined the Soviet
crusade when it declared robbery and murder to be the basis upon which
the new Russian democracy must rest. This German-Magyar-Chinese
combination was bound to meet with remarkable initial success. The
Chinese got his blood and loot in a legal way without much danger, and
the German prisoner played an important part in the defence of the
Fatherland and the destruction of its enemies.
If Germany lost on the Western Front, and by means of this unnatural
combination still retained her hold upon the potential wealth of the
late Tsar's dominions, she had indeed won the war. This was the reason
for our presence in Siberia, but it was not the reason for the presence
of Japan.