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Conroy also details toward the end of this chapter the remarkable events at the Paris Peace Conference during which China, humiliated by the transfer of Shantung, the birthplace of Confucius, from defeated Germany to Japan, first stands up as a nation, defies the gathering, and refuses to sign the Treaty of Versailles. Mass demonstrations at home bolster China in this, as this “sheet of sand” begins to transform itself into a nation. At the same time, Japan becomes enraged by the failure of the conference to include an antiracism clause.
Chapters 6 and 7 cover the 1920s. The former, “The 1920s: Rapprochement with Japan but…,” begins, “From the point of view of the United States, Far East diplomacy of the 1920s revolved around two principal efforts: (1) to rebuild Japanese friendship, without, however, admitting Japanese equality; and (2) regarding China, to continue to support open door principles, but in a lower key as a presumably ‘international’ obligation without special American effort to enforce them.”
The latter, “The 1920s: Solvency, Bolshevism, and Chinese Nationalism,” opens, “Regarding China, the expressed purpose of the Washington Conference was to give her an ‘unembarrassed opportunity’ to establish a stable government.” In subsequent pages, Conroy explains that it was actually issues of ‘solvency and Bolshevism’ that concerned the United States, Britain, Japan, and France behind the scenes.
While China’s friendly financial advisors from the Washington treaty powers spent five years in earnest conferences trying to work out ways and means to bring China into a semisolvent relationship with the open door trading club, Bolshevism busily sabotaged the whole effort. Conroy reports a “near neurosis” about Bolshevism that gripped the powers, especially Japan. Japanese foreign minister Shidehara declared, “[Bolshevism] is entirely repugnant to the essentials of Japanese character and tradition.”