Some Aspects of Japan and Her Defence Forces (1928)

First published in 1928, this collection of previously published articles entered the fray of rising tensions between Japan and Anglophone countries such as Britain, Australia and America. Japanese expansion into China had led to fortification of Britain’s Sembawang Naval Base in Singapore and Pearl Harbour in America as deterrents against the increasingly ambitious Japanese Empire. ‘The bogey of Japanese militarism’ had become ever more feared, in what the author felt was a deplorable lack of understanding about Japan and its affairs. Highlighting parallels between Japan sixty years prior and China in the present, the author began with an exploration of the effect of Far Eastern and Pacific affairs on the Anglo-Japanese alliance which, for twenty years, had formed the basis of Japan’s national defence policy. He then proceeded with an exploration of Japan’s attitudes towards contemporary issues such as armament reduction, America’s immigration laws, Britain’s Singapore base, the Chinese situation and Soviet activities in Manchuria with the hope of maintaining peace in the Far East and the Pacific.