This government assumes direct responsibility for administering whatever seems necessary or profitable. Thus, in the city of Nanking, the best buildings are occupied by the Japanese, and the Wang government is profoundly gratified to be allowed to share some of them, obtaining second choice. The Japanese military, through protected corporations, supervises the operation of the railroads and airlines, but it does not even rely on the corporations to provide military transport, which is under direct army control. If a Chinese who has gone over to the Japanese and occupies a high position in their protected governments wishes to ride on a Chinese train between Shanghai and Nanking, he must buy a ticket from a Japanese clerk, show it to a Japanese conductor under the eyes of a Japanese guard, with Japanese detectives standing about, order a Sino-Japanese or pseudo-European meal in a Japanese dining car with Japanese waitresses from a menu printed in Japanese, and must pay, not in his own puppet-bank currency, but in special Japanese currency not acceptable in Japan. To govern China, the Japanese Army has not developed beyond the usual devices of military rule. There are several reasons for this, primary among them the difficulty of governing Chinese at all. In a pluralistic society, such as China, command is largely superseded by negotiation, and the issuer of a command must be prepared for oblique thwarting. A Japanese who tells a Chinese to do something needs a bayonet with which to gesture; otherwise the Chinese, accustomed to circumventing, avoiding, or mocking authority, will disregard him. The Germans may order the Danes to make a two-way street a one-way street, and the Danes, accustomed to authority, will concur. When the Japanese promulgate a regulation, nothing short of massacre could ensure its absolute, unconditional obedience. The language difficulty is another obstacle to direct Japanese government. A cultivated Japanese and Chinese may write classical Chinese to one another, and even the barely literate can scribble a few characters, the meanings of which may coincide; but the spoken languages differ from one another almost as much as English differs from either. To govern China directly would involve an enormous feat of language training, or an overnight re-shaping of the Chinese national character. Non-violent resistance, wilful but concealed negligence, lurking impertinence, consistent sloppiness, obsequiousness mingled with hatred--these Chinese tools of resistance, added to the language barrier, prevent any early Japanese hope of direct government. In years to come, if such come, Japanese trained in the Chinese language could supersede every Chinese above the level of foreman. A strong tendency in that direction is observable in Manchoukuo.[2] [Footnote 2: Bisson, T. A., _Japan In China_, cited, _passim_, for many instances.]