With the indignation aroused by the recent Japanese China policy manifesto subsiding into an interchange of notes between the various countries concerned, the real issue at stake comes to the fore: whether Japan will be able to secure her position in the Far East economically as the fundamental requisite for the maintenance of here claims for doing so politically. The opening of new trade war that encompasses the British Empire, and hence the world, is the opening gun of the struggle which will be more likely to prove the strength or weakness of Japan's position relative to the Western World than all the diplomatic interchanges that have resulted from her recent stand.

It is in just this respect that the weakness of the Western powers is most evident where China is concerned. That Japan will submit tamely to the closing or restriction of her markets in the British Empire is a Utopian dream. Retaliation will occur which may well take the form of an intensified effort to cultivate Chine still more assiduously than in the past as Japan's special province for her overflow of goods. The existence of Japan, like England, depends absolutely on the maintenance of here expert market; but whereas England has the Empire in which to trade advantageously, Japan's markets, with the exemption of Chine, are all under the control of her principal adversaries, potential and real, and Chine itself is largely a subdivision of European interests. Hence there can be little doubt but that the trade war precipitated by England must have the ultimate effect of intensifying the question of the open door in Chine. Japan, like Germany, will be forced into the position of a nation against whom all the principal markets of the world are closed, but unlike Germany prostrate, will not be in such circumstances as to choke down here wrath as best she may. In short, the possibility of idle looms in Osaka will undoubtedly prove a more potent force in bringing about a quick showdown as to Japan's real Oriental policy than any amount of diplomatic dickering can reveal.