"When one Kiyokishy Yoshimoto, aged 27, an employé of a Japanese apothecary at Chengchiatun, was passing the headquarters of the Chinese troops on the 13th instant, a Chinese soldier stopped him, and, with some remarks, which were unintelligible to the Japanese, suddenly struck him on the head. Yoshimoto became enraged, but was soon surrounded by a large number of Chinese soldiers and others, who subjected him to all kind of humiliation. As a result of this lawlessness on the part of the Chinese, the Japanese sustained injuries in seven or eight places, but somehow he managed to break away and reach a Japanese police box, where he applied for help. On receipt of this news, a policeman, named Kowase, hastened to the spot, but by the time he arrived there all the offenders had fled. He therefore repaired to the headquarters of the Chinese to lay a complaint, but the sentry stopped him, and presented a pistol at him, and under these circumstances he was obliged to apply to the Japanese Garrison headquarters, where Captain Inone instructed Lieutenant Matsuo with twenty men to escort the policeman to the Chinese headquarters. When the party approached the Chinese headquarters, Chinese troops began to fire, and the policeman and others were either killed or wounded. Despite the fact that the Japanese troops retired, the Chinese troops did not give up firing, but besieged the Japanese garrison, delivering several severe attacks. Soon after the fighting ceased, the Chinese authorities visited the Japanese barracks, and expressed the desire that the affair be settled amicably. It was the original intention of the Japanese troops to fight it out, but they were completely outnumbered, and lest the safety of the Japanese residents be endangered, they stopped fighting. On examination of the dead bodies of seven Japanese soldiers, who were attacked outside the barracks, it was discovered that they had been all slain by the Chinese troops, the bodies bearing marks of violence."
Without entering again into the merits of the case, we would ask those who are acquainted with recent history whether it is likely that Chinese soldiers, knowing all the pains and penalties attaching to such action, would deliberately attack a body of twenty armed Japanese under an officer as the Japanese official account states? We believe that no impartial tribunal, investigating the matter on the spot, could fail to point out the real aggressors and withal lay bare the web of a most amazing state of affairs. For in order to understand what occurred, on the 13th August, 1916, it is necessary to turn far away from Chengchiatun and see what lies behind it all.
At the back of the brain of the Japanese Military Party, which by no means represents the Japanese nation or the Japanese Government although it exercises a powerful influence on both, is the fixed idea that South Manchuria and Inner Mongolia must be turned into a strongly held and fortified Japanese enclave, if the balance of power in Eastern Asia is to be maintained. Pursuant to this idea, Japanese diplomacy was induced many months ago to concentrate its efforts on winning—if not wringing —from Russia the strategically important strip of railway south of the Sungari River, because (and this should be carefully noted) with the Sungari as the undisputed dividing-line between the Russian and Japanese spheres in Manchuria, and with Japanese shallow-draft gun-boats navigating that waterway and entering the Nonni river, it would be easily possible for Japan to complete a "Continental quadrilateral" which would include Korea, South Manchuria and Inner Mongolia, the extreme western barrier of which would be the new system of Inner Mongolian railways centring round Taonanfu and terminating at Jehol, for which Japan already holds the building rights[[23]]. Policing rights—in the outer zone of this enclave,—with a total exclusion of all Chinese garrisons, is the preliminary goal towards which the Japanese Military Party has been long plainly marching; and long before anybody had heard of Chengchiatun, a scheme of reconnoitring detachments had been put in force to spy out the land and form working alliances with the Mongol bands in order to harass and drive away all the representatives of Chinese authority. What occurred, then, at Chengchiatun might have taken place at any one of half-a-dozen other places in this vast and little-known region whither Japanese detachments have silently gone; and if Chinese diplomacy in the month of August, 1916, was faced with a rude surprise, it was only what political students had long been expecting. For though Japan should be the real defender of Chinese liberties, it is a fact that in Chinese affairs Japanese diplomacy has been too long dictated to by the Military Party in Tokio and attempts nothing save when violence allows it to tear from China some fresh portion of her independence.
And here we reach the crux of the matter. One of the little known peculiarities of the day lies in the fact that Japan is the land of political inaction because there is no tradition of action save that which has been built up by the military and naval chiefs since the Chinese war of 1894-95. Having only visualized the world in international terms during two short decades, there has been no time for a proper tradition to be created by the civil government of Japan; and because there is no such tradition, the island empire of the East has no true foreign policy and is at the mercy of manufactured crises, being too often committed to petty adventures which really range her on the side of those in Europe the Allies have set themselves to destroy. It is for this reason that the Chinese are consistently treated as though they were hewers of wood and drawers of water, helots who are occasionally nattered in the columns of the daily press and yet are secretly looked upon as men who have been born merely to be cuffed and conquered. The Moukden Governor, General Chang Tso-lin, discussing the Chengchiatun affair with the writer, put the matter in a nutshell. Striking the table he exclaimed: "After all we are not made of wood like this, we too are flesh and blood and must defend our own people. A dozen times I have said, 'Let them come and take Manchuria openly if they dare, but let them cease their childish intrigues.' Why do they not do so? Because they are not sure they can swallow us—not at all sure. Do you understand? We are weak, we are stupid, we are divided, but we are innumerable, and in the end, if they persist, China will burst the Japanese stomach."
Such passionate periods are all very well, but when it comes to the sober business of the council chamber it is a regrettable fact that Chinese, although foreign friends implore them to do so, do not properly use the many weapons in their armoury. Thus in this particular case, instead of at once hurrying to Chengchiatun some of the many foreign advisers who sit kicking their heels in Peking from one end of the year to the other and who number competent jurisconsults, China did next to nothing. No proper report was drawn up on the spot; sworn statements were not gathered, nor were witnesses brought to Peking; and it therefore happened that when Japan filed her demands for redress, China had not in her possession anything save an utterly inadequate defence. Mainly because of this she was forced to agree to forgoing any direct discussion of the rights and wrongs of the case, proceeding directly to negotiations based on the various claims which Japan filed and which were as follows:—
1. Punishment of the General commanding the 28th Division.
2. The dismissal of officers at Chengchiatun responsible for the occurrence as well as the severe punishment of those who took direct part in the fracas.
3. Proclamations to be posted ordering all Chinese soldiers and civilians in South Manchuria and Eastern Inner Mongolia to refrain from any act calculated to provoke a breach of the peace with Japanese soldiers or civilians.
4. China to agree to the stationing of Japanese police officers in places in South Manchuria and Eastern Inner Mongolia where their presence was considered necessary for the protection of Japanese subjects. China also to agree to the engagement by the officials of South Manchuria of Japanese police advisers.
And in addition:—