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Check. But just as Araki seemed most certain of being rid of it, the League stiffened. Reason: U. S. Secretary of State Henry Lewis Stimson had caused his ambassador to remind all Foreign Powers that, in effect, the U. S. would not recognize conquest by force. The U. S. became the last obstacle in the Divine Emperor's way. But in the mind of Sadao Araki there is just one means (to date highly successful) to overcome obstacles: the sword of the Samurai.
"Beat Any Other Army!" Japan stood last week somewhat in the bright position of Imperial Germany when Bismarck was looking for and finding many a "Place in the Sun," such as German East Africa.
What a Prussian officer was a Japanese officer is—only much more so, according to recent statements by War Minister Araki which reached the U. S. last week. Only Japanese soldiers and officers, he declared, are denied by their "Way of the Warrior" or military code any possibility of surrendering to the enemy and continuing to live thereafter. If captured, even after being knocked unconscious (as was famed Japanese Major Koga at Shanghai last year), a member of the Japanese Army must commit suicide (as Major Koga did).
"So long as there lives among our soldiers the spirit which Major Koga has shown," declared War Minister Araki, "the Japanese Army can hope to beat any other army! . . . Retreat is absolutely forbidden in the Japanese Army, but this is not so with foreign armies. They retreat whenever they are at a disadvantage in battle. . . . This is no way of fighting! Our lives, from the very beginning, are given up for His Majesty!" (Elsewhere Lieut-General Araki has said that a Japanese officer, in extraordinary circumstances, may command his men to "advance" in a rearward direction.)
War Minister Araki looks for a spiritual rebirth of the world through Japanese military example. "Where Japan's real strength is felt," he often says, "there is peace and order."
This concept of peace & order in "The Way of the Perfect Emperor" and in "The Way of the Warrior," Lieut.-General Araki sometimes abbreviates by the term "Japanism," urges Japan's representatives abroad to explain and spread its gospel. Best explanation so far is that of Japanese Delegate to the League of Nations Yosuke Matsuoka, who represents Japan in Geneva this week and recently declared: "Japan can offer spirituality to America and to the entire Western world. . . . Japanism is a world communism of moral responsibility, ideals, obligations and honor, unlimited by time, unbounded by distance or area and irrespective of race or nationality. . . . No individual has arisen in the 20th century, no nation has achieved the leisure to lead and inspire. . . . Japan can achieve this task. She has it in her."
"Not In My Line." That such notions surge behind Japan's struggle for her "Place in the Sun" on the Continent of Asia the Great Powers must realize, or ignore the fact of self-styled "Japanese spirituality" to their cost.