ambitions different from theirs as regards China. We must therefore
distinguish three possibilities: (1) China may become enslaved to one or
more white nations; (2) China may become enslaved to Japan; (3) China
may recover and retain her liberty. Temporarily there is a fourth
possibility, namely that a consortium of Japan and the White Powers may
control China; but I do not believe that, in the long run, the Japanese
will be able to co-operate with England and America. In the long run, I
believe that Japan must dominate the Far East or go under. If the
Japanese had a different character this would not be the case; but the
nature of their ambitions makes them exclusive and unneighbourly. I
shall give the reasons for this view when I come to deal with the
relations of China and Japan.

To understand the problem of China, we must first know something of
Chinese history and culture before the irruption of the white man, then
something of modern Chinese culture and its inherent tendencies; next,
it is necessary to deal in outline with the military and diplomatic
relations of the Western Powers with China, beginning with our war of
1840 and ending with the treaty concluded after the Boxer rising of
1900. Although the Sino-Japanese war comes in this period, it is
possible to separate, more or less, the actions of Japan in that war,
and to see what system the White Powers would have established if Japan
had not existed. Since that time, however, Japan has been the dominant
foreign influence in Chinese affairs. It is therefore necessary to
understand how the Japanese became what they are: what sort of nation
they were before the West destroyed their isolation, and what influence
the West has had upon them. Lack of understanding of Japan has made
people in England blind to Japan's aims in China, and unable to
apprehend the meaning of what Japan has done.