Japan Presents Demands
The disaster in France has had immediate repercussions in Cie Far East. Just before the surrender of the Bordeaux Government the French Ambassador in Tokyo accepted Japan's demands that the transport of motor-vehicles, petrol and other specified goods from Indo-China into China should be pro- hibited. Thus one important route by which the Chinese armies have been supplied is already closed. Next the Japanese Government is addressing itself to Great Britain and requesting that she should stop supplies along the Burma Road and through the territory of Hongkong. Lamentable as is the form of this demand, some of its importance disappears in view of the fact that neither Britain nor the United States have much war material to spare, though the latter might send petrol. The capitulation of France has raised even larger issues in the Far East. Japan, believing that the French overseas Empire is crumbling, has sent troops to the French Indo- China border with the ostensible object of " cutting off by force " the transport of supplies to China. In declaring that she recognises the Petain Government at Bordeaux Japan thereby appears to withhold recognition from the French authorities in Indo-China, which repudiate the Petain armistice.
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