The Manchurian Crisis Developments in Manchuria are profoundly alarming, and
developments in Paris, where the League Council is discussing the Manchurian question, far from reassuring. Japanese troops, after a battle on a considerable scale, have captured Anganchi and Tsitsihar, which means that they are astride the Chinese Eastern -Railway and consequently in direct contact with the Soviet authorities who manage that railway in conjunction with the Chinese. The gravity of the possibilities -pre• sented there needs no emphasis. Quite apart from the danger of that particular complication, it- is hard to see how open war between Japan and China, which means war. elsewhere than in. Manchuria, can be avoided unless the League Council, with American co-operation, achieves some immediate success. Of that there is so far no sign. The rumoured concentration on the proposal to send a League Commission to Manchuria, to investigate both China's capacity to protect Japanese subjects and the question of the treaties which Japan says arc not being fulfilled, is a step in the right direction, but Japan .has consistently put herself, and kept herself, in the wrong so far by refusing any practical intervention by the League—a strange" attitude for a permanent member of the League to adopt.
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