It is obvious to all that Japan was restricted and developed after World War I, first of all, the United States, in order to seize the hegemony of the world, advocated the abolition of the Japan-Britain alliance, and at the same time limited the strength of the navy's capital ships at the Washington Conference and abolished Ishii. The Lansing Agreement, the restriction of Japan's special rights and interests in Manchuria, as stipulated in the Nine-Power Treaty, and the enactment of an anti-Japanese immigration ban by the United States, cast a shadow over Japan's future.

It is not difficult to see that the purpose of these measures is to stop Japan's development, especially Japan's development to the mainland.

In addition, after the First World War, as an inevitable economic phenomenon after the war, overproduction was caused in the world market, which led to the sharpening of international trade competition.

As a backward capitalist country, Japan, was drawn into the intensifying international trade competition as it became increasingly necessary to import goods from overseas and open up markets overseas as it advanced in industrialization during the World War II. A poor country like Japan, which is not rich in materials and funds, has to find a miserable way out by relying on cheap labor to dump abroad.

However, in order to combat dumping, European and American countries have adopted measures to build high tariff barriers among themselves. Japan has had to be gradually squeezed out of the world markets such as India and the Southern Market.

The economic crisis that occurred in the fourth year of the Showa era (1929) also dealt a heavy blow to the Japanese economy, especially the poverty in rural fishing villages. As a result of this crisis, the tariff war in the world intensified, and the protective industrial policies of the United Kingdom and the United States were strengthened, and finally at the Ottawa Conference in 1932, Showa 7. The so-called bloc economy that developed into the British Empire.

In this way, the free flow of labor, goods, and capital between countries has finally been blocked. The doctrine of national self-determination, adopted at the Versailles Peace Conference, could only be viable if it was guaranteed by a normal international economic order. However, as mentioned above, when the international economy is blockaded by the bloc, the survival of a country like Japan, which is overpopulated, poor in resources, and underfunded, is fundamentally threatened.

Japanese people are also human beings, and they have their own joys, sorrows, and sorrows. All kinds of actions by Western countries are completely playing with Japan as a fool. As long as it is a normal country, it will be angry at this kind of behavior. In fact, Japan's relations with Western capitalist countries fell to a freezing point after World War I.

To this day, the Japanese did not have the slightest affection for Europe and the United States, so they seized the colonies of Western countries in Southeast Asia. The Japanese don't have any psychological burden at all. And it will get more support from the people. But compare to it. Not to mention the danger of attacking the Soviet Union, and there are not many people supporting it at home, there is basically no need to consider how to choose the Japanese government.

The Japanese refused the request of the German government. Although Japan is an ally of Germany, there is no need for Japan to put the future of the whole of Japan into it for the sake of this "friendship." That is irrational and unrealistic.

The Chinese side was also extremely dissatisfied with the signing of a neutral peace treaty between Japan and the Soviet Union. When the news came, there was an uproar in China, and at the same time, it was even more gloomy. As everyone knows, after the Sino-Japanese war, especially after Japan captured all of China's foreign ports, the only country that could come to the nearest aid and was willing to assist China was the Soviet Union.

So far, the Soviet Union has provided $200 million in military loans to China, trained 10,206 Chinese aviation personnel, and purchased 1,285 aircraft from the Soviet Union. Among them, 777 destroyers, 328 CE medium-range bombers, 30 IIe long-range bombers, 50 TE-3 heavy bombers, and 100 trainer aircraft. In addition, there are engines, fuel, aviation ammunition, etc.

From December 1937, when they secretly participated in the war over Nanjing, to the end of 1939, when they were basically withdrawn from airfields in various places, a total of more than 700 Soviet volunteers directly participated in 25 battles to defend Nanjing, Wuhan, Nanchang, Chengdu, Chongqing, Lanzhou, and other places, dispatched more than 1,000 sorties, shot down hundreds of Japanese planes, and sank more than 70 Japanese ships of various types. This is only the amount of weapons and equipment that the Soviet Union provided to the Nationalist Government, and if you add the northern part of the country, the number and scale are even greater.

It can be said that before the United States and Britain formally assisted China, the only ally of Soviet-style China was the nurse, but once this neutrality treaty was signed, the nurse was gone, so the signing of the Soviet-Japanese neutrality treaty had a great impact on China, and even related to the future of China's War of Resistance.

According to the agreement between the Soviet Union and Japan, in the future, the Soviet Union will shift from supporting China to a neutral stance in the Sino-Japanese War, which is a retrogression of the Soviet Union on the issue of Sino-Soviet relations. At the same time, the Soviet Union's aid to China was sharply reduced and gradually suspended, which weakened China's anti-Japanese military strength.

Therefore, this treaty was politically a blow to China's war of resistance, hurting the anti-Japanese enthusiasm of the Chinese people and damaging the image of the Soviet Union. This treaty not only aroused the Nationalist government's anxiety about the future of the war and its disgust towards the Soviet government, but also caused other parts of China to express dissatisfaction with the "treaty."

As Japanese Foreign Minister Yoyo Matsuoka said to the German ambassador to the Soviet Union on the day the treaty was signed: "This treaty is of great importance to Japan, and it will be an extremely great pressure on the Chinese Nationalist Government, which may easily force China to bend its knees and sue for peace; At the same time, Japan's position against Britain and the United States strengthened. ”

It was for this reason that the Japanese government was "delighted" with the treaty, and Prime Minister Konoe quickly obtained the Emperor's ratification, as Fumima Konoe stated in a letter to Japanese Foreign Minister Yoyoshi Matsuoka: "Because this treaty eased the Army's long-standing impulse to fight Russia, brought the hope of bringing Chiang Kai-shek to its knees, and made the road to the south safer." Perhaps even the U.S. government will be a little more lenient. ”

In fact, according to the Japanese government's idea, it is better to sign the "Soviet-Japanese Non-Aggression Pact", and they are still working in this direction. At the outset, the Japanese ambassador to the Soviet Union, Shigetoku Togo, during his talks with the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union Molotov, proposed the first draft of the Sino-Soviet neutrality agreement, which included: "Article 1 1. The Contracting Parties affirm that the basis of mutual relations between the two countries is the Treaty on the Basic Principles of Mutual Relations between Japan and the Soviet Union, signed in Beijing on January 20, 1925. 2. The two Contracting Parties shall maintain peaceful and friendly relations and respect each other's territorial integrity. Article 2 If one of the contracting parties, albeit a peace-loving act, is attacked by a third State or several other States, the other party will remain neutral throughout the conflict. ”

Later, when Ambassador Togo called on the Soviet Diplomatic Commission, he claimed that the new Japanese cabinet headed by Konoe wanted to conclude a Japan-Soviet neutrality agreement as soon as possible, and requested that the draft agreement he had forwarded be promptly studied and replied to.

However, the Soviets, having analyzed what Japan had proposed, decided that in terms of its contents, the agreement would not only be a neutral treaty, but in fact a treaty of non-aggression and non-participation in a hostile alliance. In addition, the Soviet government considered it necessary to state that the interests of the USSR with Japan, including those of the neutrality pact, demanded, first of all, the resolution of certain very important issues in Soviet-Japanese relations; If these problems are not resolved, they will become a serious obstacle to improving the relations between the two countries, both now and in the future.

Subsequently, in its reply, the Soviet Government made a detailed analysis of the specific provisions of the draft neutrality agreement proposed by the Japanese Government, pointing out that when the Soviet Union concluded a neutrality treaty with Japan, it might to a certain extent worsen its relations with China and a series of countries with major interests in the Pacific and South China Sea regions, and this could cause serious, not only economic losses, to the Soviet Union. The USSR wanted to reduce its losses, so Ambassador Togo's motion was shelved.

At the end of April 1940, the new Japanese ambassador to the Soviet Union, Miji Kenkawa, held talks with Molotov again, and Miji Jianchuan said that the Japanese Government hoped to conclude a "Soviet-Japanese Non-Aggression Pact" with the Soviet Union, similar to the "Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact." All disputed issues between the two countries should be resolved after the conclusion of a non-aggression pact. Miji Kenkawa believes that the neutrality treaty is not sufficient, because it is not clear enough on the issue of mutual non-aggression.

At the same time, Miji Kenkawa sent the Soviet side a copy of the "Draft Japanese-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact," which specifically contained: "Article 1: The two parties undertake to respect each other's territorial sovereignty and not to take any aggressive action against the other, whether such action is taken alone or jointly by one or several third countries; Article 2 If one of the contracting parties becomes the object of aggression by one or more third States, the other contracting party undertakes not to support those third States in any way; Article 3 The Governments of the two States Parties shall maintain close contacts in the future in order to exchange information or provide advice on issues detrimental to the common interests of the two Governments. Article 4 Contracting Parties undertake not to participate in any group of States directly or indirectly against the other Party; Article 5 In the event of any dispute or conflict between the two Contracting Parties, the dispute shall be resolved by peaceful means in accordance with the friendly exchange of views or, if necessary, the establishment of a conflict mediation committee. Article 6 This Treaty shall enter into force on the date of signature and shall be valid for a period of 10 years. If either of the Contracting Parties does not declare its abrogation within one year prior to the expiration of this Treaty, the Treaty shall be automatically extended for a period of five years. ”

However, the Soviet Government was not satisfied with this draft, so Molotov pointed out in reply to Ambassador Miji Kenkawa: "If the Japanese Government is not prepared to raise the issue of returning the territories lost by the Soviet Union earlier -- South Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands, then it would be appropriate to discuss the conclusion of a neutrality pact rather than a non-aggression pact, because the conclusion of a neutrality pact could be concluded without involving territorial issues, and only by canceling Japan's concessions on North Sakhalin and reaching an agreement." (To be continued......)