The Fight for the Republic in ChinaPutnam Weale, B. L. (Bertram Lenox)
History
The Fight for the Republic in China
Putnam Weale, B. L. (Bertram Lenox)
China -- History -- Republic, 1912-1949; China -- Politics and government
For us to incite the Chinese revolutionists and malcontents to rise
in China we consider the present to be the most opportune moment.
The reason why these men cannot now carry on an active campaign is
because they are insufficiently provided with funds. If the Imperial
Government can take advantage of this fact to make them a loan and
instruct them to rise simultaneously, great commotion and disorder
will surely prevail all over China. We can intervene and easily
adjust matters.
The progress of the European War warns Japan with greater urgency of
the imperative necessity of solving this most vital of questions.
The Imperial Government cannot be considered as embarking on a rash
project. This opportunity will not repeat itself for our benefit. We
must avail ourselves of this chance and under no circumstances
hesitate. Why should we wait for the spontaneous uprising of the
revolutionists and malcontents? Why should we not think out and lay
down a plan beforehand? When we examine into the form of Government
in China, we must ask whether the existing Republic is well suited
to the national temperament and well adapted to the thoughts and
aspirations of the Chinese people. From the time the Republic of
China was established up to the present moment, if what it has
passed through is to be compared to what it ought to be in the
matter of administration and unification, we find disappointment
everywhere. Even the revolutionists themselves, the very ones who
first advocated the Republican form of government, acknowledge that
they have made a mistake. The retention of the Republican form of
Government in China will be a great future obstacle in the way of a
Chino-Japanese Alliance. And why must it be so? Because, in a
Republic the fundamental principles of government as well as the
social and moral aims of the people are distinctly different from
that of a Constitutional Monarchy. Their laws and administration
also conflict. If Japan act as a guide to China and China models
herself after Japan, it will only then be possible for the two
nations to solve by mutual effort the Far East Question without
differences and disagreements. Therefore to start from the
foundation for the purpose of reconstructing the Chinese
Government, of establishing a Chino-Japanese Alliance, of
maintaining the permanent peace of the Far East and of realizing the
consummation of Japan's Imperial policy, we must take advantage of
the present opportunity to alter China's Republican form of
Government into a Constitutional Monarchy which shall necessarily be
identical, in all its details, to the Constitutional Monarchy of
Japan, and to no other. This is really the key and first principle
to be firmly held for the actual reconstruction of the form of
Government in China. If China changes her Republican form of
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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