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London also believed that Japan was on the warpath. The exiled Government of The Netherlands learned from Batavia that Japan had served new demands on the East Indies. (The Japanese Government refuses to deal directly with the Dutch Government in London, calls it a puppet of Britain.) These demands included permission to "explore" islands around the Indies, concessions for mining and fisheries, exploitation of undeveloped regions, permission for Japanese laborers, shopkeepers and professional men to work in the East Indies, the right to operate an air service between the Indies and Japan. Neither Batavia nor Queen Wilhelmina's Government in London had any intention of signing such a blank check. The next move was up to Japan.
Creeping South. Japan had already moved. Two flotillas of the Japanese Navy steamed out of the Yangtze and crossed the Gulf of Tonkin to Hainan Island. Five Japanese warships arrived in the Gulf of Siam, inside Thailand's territorial waters. Japanese ships patrolled the entire coast of French Indo-China and Thailand, as far west as Bangkok. More Japanese troops moved into French Indo-China, while Tokyo blandly announced that the Thailand-French Indo-China armistice had been extended to Feb. 25. As a price for "mediating" that pint-size war Japan has demanded air bases in southern Thailand and may have got them by now. By Feb. 25 Japan could have a firm grip on the long Malayan gooseneck that dangles down to the British Federated Malay States and the fortress of Singapore.
On that fortress and on her three other great naval fortresses (the British Isles, Gibraltar, Suez) depends Britain's life as an empire. Without Singapore, Britain could no longer freely get men and materials to the Mediterranean by way of Suez; without Singapore, she would no longer control the Indian Ocean; without Singapore, her empire would break in two. To meet the Japanese threat Britain rushed troops north from Singapore to a point close to the Thailand border, where they began digging in. Some reports estimated available British effectives at 90,000. Squadrons of bombers droned after them, settled down on advance air bases in the farthest north of the F. M. S. Minelayers blocked off the shipping route through the Straits of Singapore. If the Japanese objective was Singapore, the Empire would not be caught dozing.
Grand Strategy. Japan's eventual objective, as Japan has made clear long since, is an Asiatic empire embracing an area as great as North and South America. It would extend westward through India and southward through Australia, whose key city, Sydney, is as far from Shanghai as Rio de Janeiro is from New York. To the Japanese it seems only logical that the strongest power in Asia should rule a great empire, but to U. S. citizens it is almost as if Newfoundland wanted to boss the U. S., the West Indies and Brazil (see map, p. 29). Standing in the way of Japan's grand objective are the Chinese Army, the land forces of British, Dutch and U. S. possessions, the British and U. S. Navies. Bulwark of all this strength is the naval base of Singapore.