Friday, 20 October
Fine
I studied Russian from 11.00 until 1.00 in the afternoon.
The American political analyst Walter Lippmann recently reprinted his new book U.S.War Aims. The main content is as follows: 1) Regarding the war with Japan: Though it was started by the Japanese attacking Pearl Harbor, as a matter of fact, it was because the Americans tried to stop Japanese aggression in China. Because of its aggressive policy Japan was successful, Japan would take hold of the Chinese population and its resources and would unify Asia. Japan would then try to take global hegemony, and in this way the United States would be threatened. The American war with Germany was also because it feared that after Germany conquered all Europe, its target would be the United States. Therefore it joined the war because it was the war of self-defence.
2) The American target after the war: It would naturally be based on the dangerous situation in the past and try to solve it. Therefore his personal opinion was the United States should work with Britain, France, Canada and countries in Western Europe to form an “Atlantic group”, and the Soviet Union and countries in Eastern Europe to form another, China to set up another in the Far East. They would have their respective spheres of influence and would not offend others, as well as cooperating with each other.
3) European political problems: the United States should not interfere. Regarding the problems with Germany, they should be decided by the European countries which have suffered. As for Japan, it should be the Chinese who make the decisions.
4) According to his research on war and peace in the past, he estimated that if there were any big incident it would happen fifteen years later. Therefore, in 1960, Germany would rise again and be the aggressor or it would become a peace-loving country. Therefore the Allies at least had to maintain close cooperation with Germany for fifteen years, so as to make the Germans not to make any aggressive attempts and the peace-loving elements in Germany would have the chance to change their country, pressing down militarists for ever. Otherwise the Germans may be given the chance of separating the Soviet Union and the Atlantic groups, and the future would be bleak. But of course, we could not afford not to offer Germany a chance for revival. Therefore, probably Germany could join the Soviet group. But this put the Soviet Union in a big disadvantage because it was difficult to defend the enemy from within. This would also mean a stronger threat to the Atlantic group. Therefore, he advocated that after Germany was completely decommissioned it should obtain an understanding from the Soviet Union, and put it into economic and trading associations in the Atlaantic region.
5) As for the American-Soviet relationship, he thought that in the future if the Third World War unfortunately erupts, it would certainly be because the United States and Soviet Union could not cooperate. Between the United States and the Soviet Union originally there was no conflict of interests, but if one side interfered in the matters within the sphere of the other side, such as one side being in conflict with either Germany or Japan, or in the Atlantic countries like Britain or France attempting to have a special relation with Poland, or the Soviet Union being in touch with Mexico, or the United States coming into close relations with either Iran or Romania, conflicts would spontaneously happen, and a great war become unavoidable. Therefore all these groups should try to maintain and remain confined within their own spheres and try not to interfere with the affairs of the other groups.
6) The Soviet Union should gradually give freedom to its people, and it should allow its people to know all foreign news. It is also necessary for people outside to know what is happening in the Soviet Union. Otherwise the various freedoms stated in the constitution become no more than mere text, which is completely out of touch with the spirit of democracy, and the basis of future cooperation would not be solid. After the Germans and Japanese are defeated, there will be no need for the Soviet Union to impose tight planning-controls over its country, and during this time the United States should urge the Soviet Union to implement what it regulated in the 1936 Constitution that it would give people every type of freedom. If the Soviet Union left it unattended we should not try to fool ourselves. We should not give up all the preparations, so as to cope with a world in which peace is impossible.
7) The failure of Wilson in the past was he hastily dissolved the alliance during the war and wanted to replace it with an ideal peace organisation to maintain peace and order. We shouldn’t repeat this mistake. His second mistake was that he advocated the self-determination of people, thus dividing countries. This policy was totally in contrary to American traditional policy and it was not allowed by the law of civilisation progress. If the division never ended, the world would be turned into a huge pile of loose sand with each nation only concerned with its private interests with no awareness of public interest. It would be easily manipulated by aggressive invaders, The near success of Hitler was completely because of this, therefore we should try our best to reward the unity of regions.
The author published U.S.Foreign Policy: Shield of the Republic last year, and had a very big influence on American public opinion. Now he has re-published this book, its influence to the American side is substantial, and it was enough to represent the American politicians’ general ideas. With regard to China, he has placed it quite highly which I was certainly glad about it. As for advocating that the Soviet Union shouldn’t interfere with its sphere of interest, it was a very practical suggestion. But if he wished to change the internal politics of the Soviet Union, his hope was perhaps too high to be realistic. I thought this type of thing could not be hurried. We could only hope that when the Soviet Union had more contact with outside it could gradually change, but this could not be accomplished overnight. All in all, what he advocated was much more progressive than the “ism” which Churchill advocated to absolutely maintain spheres of influence of the British Empire.
Today the United States officially announced the news of the landing at Letye Island in the central part of the Philippines. They used more than 250,000 troops, over 600 ships, and the Australian navy and air force also took part. The total of Japanese troops defending the whole Philippines should be around 225,000, which was led by (Japanese name). This action could eliminate more than 200,000 enemy troops, it could also cut off the routes of retreat for more than 500,000 Japanese army recruits in Nanyang.
Today the Red Army announced that it has liberated Belgrade, the capital of Yugoslavia.