“Everybody Knows It But Us"

 

American Ideas Will
Lead the World for 4,000
Years, Says Ambassador
Johnson—Ancient Des:
potism Now Is Making
Last Stand Against the
“New Order” of Free-
dom. Spreading From
This Country, Veteran
Observer Insists.

 

The Star’s Special News Service herewith presents one of the most
thoughtful and forceful expressions of American ‘faith and American
position in the present world crisis yet to come from a representative

' of our government. It was obtained by Clarke Beach in an interview
with Nelson T, Johnson, who has just returned to Washington from
the American embassy in China and whose observations are based on
thirty-four years of. service in the United States diplomatic service.

(By The Star’s Special News Service.) -
MERICAN ideas will lead the world for 4,000 years. This war is
the last stand of the old order against American ways and
A ideas.
“The wave of the future lies right here in the United
States of America, and the funny part is that everybody in the world
knows it but us. :

“All the world is watching us. No American can travel in other
countries without seeing that.

“Before the war, when you stood on a street corner in the busy
sections of Paris and London you could feel the throb of the energy |
coming from the American dynamo, All the vital things you saw were
an expression of the American spirit. We are doing the things that
they want todo, We are the heart and epitome of the new order which

has been on the way for 2,000 years,
“In the United States we have a new world with new foundations,

with human freedom as a basis.

 

Nelson Trusler Johnsen, who has*

spent thirty-four years in the China
service of the state department and
has just relinquished his post as
United States ambassador to Chung-
king, thus sums up his analysis of
the struggles in the East and the
West.

“Fascism is a revival of ancient
despotism, making its last stand
against the new order,” he continues.
“In the United States we have given
expression to the spirit of human
liberty, and we have found that in-
dustry, progress and better living
goes along with this. In the history
of the earth, human beings never
have achieved so much in so short
(a time.

“Our new found belief in man’s
ability to govern himself is opposed
to the belief of the Nazis that man
is the victim of environment, cir-
cumstances, with his life in the
hands of an angry God, and all he
can do is to get on his knees and

 

placate that God through some high |
priest—Mr, Hitler.

“Essential in the struggle between
China and Japan is the cause of the |'
old oriental order which Japan cham-
pions, and this order which we have
given to the world and of which
China was rapidly becoming the
champion. Japan is trying to im-
pose its ancient Wang Tao (the
kingly way) on China.”

Real Democrats in China,

Mr. Johnson pointed out that most
of the Chinese who are prominent in |
government, industry and science got
their ideas from the United States,
and many of them were educated
here. The Chinese people, he added,
“are essentially individualists, in one |
sense the most democratic people in|
the world. They are the only oriental
people who have shown a deep inter-
est in democratic government.”

The ambassador compared the vi-

 

(Continued on Page 5A.)