The Japanese have made little progress towards Hankow in the
last week. Their main operation has been intended to prevent Chinese reinforcements reaching the city from Chengchow, and it is predicted that the final attack will be postponed until the late summer, when the danger of being trapped by floods, as on the Yellow River, will have dis- appeared. It is clear that in China, as in Spain, the war will be profoundly affected by the development of the European crisis. After a preliminary statement that Japan was in no way affected by the fate of Czechoslovakia, which concerned the Berlin-Rome axis alone, Tokyo has apparently found that it could not remain indifferent' and declared that it would support Germany in an and-Comintern war. This may well seem to threaten the U.S.S.R. with the dreaded "war on two fronts " ; but in fact Japan is so deeply involved in China that her resources would hardly allow of any extension of hostilities. Even the fall of Hankow would not end China's resistance, and a Japanese attack on the U.S.S.R. is hardly conceivable when her hold on China is so precarious. Indeed, both Germany's partners in the anti-Comintern pact have so deeply committed themselves, the one in Spain and Abyssinia, the other in China, as to diminish greatly their value as allies. The United States, moreover, is watching Japanese activities closely.
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