Paris 1919 - Margaret Macmillan [219]
Unfortunately, the issue of Shantung was not decided in January. It had to wait until the frantic race in April, when the final clauses of the treaty with Germany were put together. By that time the peacemakers were juggling hundreds of decisions, giving way on one, insisting on another, trying to satisfy impossible demands so that there would be a treaty for the Germans that all the Allies would sign. The Chinese and their hopes were a small and insignificant part of the calculations. Wilson himself was being forced into the sort of horse-trading he hated, gaining Japan’s assent to the League covenant, even without the racial equality clause, at the cost of his own principles. If the League was the best hope of the world, then perhaps the sacrifice of a small piece of China was worth it.
In the long hiatus, the Chinese and Japanese delegations were busy. Both sides showed that they had grasped an important element in the new international relations as they argued their case in public through speeches and interviews. While the Japanese delegation in Paris had a highly effective information section, most bystanders felt that China got the best of it, perhaps because their demands were more in tune with the mood of the times. During the first part of February, there was a very public dispute over the release of the secret agreements that China had signed with Japan. The Japanese delegation was taken aback when Clemenceau and the other leaders suggested that it might be a good idea to lay the documents before the Peace Conference. Koo, seeing a chance to embarrass Japan, agreed with alacrity and wired his government for copies. In Peking, the Japanese ambassador made a heavy-handed attempt to persuade the Chinese government not to release any documents without the consent of the Japanese government. News of this leaked into the press and not only further inflamed Chinese opinion but deepened American mistrust of Japan.27
The Chinese delegates wined and dined the experts and the foreign journalists. Lu arranged for the Chinese government to make donations to the French and Belgian governments to rebuild schools in Verdun and Ypres. But behind the scenes the Japanese did better. In private interviews that spring with Lloyd George and Balfour, with Clemenceau and his foreign minister, Pichon, they got the reassurance they wanted. Although they did not expect much from the American delegation, they had cordial interviews with House. As the Japanese explained it, the Chinese were attempting to renege on solemn promises. What helped Japan’s case most of all was their willingness not to push the racial equality clause.28
On April 21, just before the Italians walked out of the Peace Conference, Makino and Chinda called on Wilson and Lansing to tell them that Japan wanted the dispute with China settled before the treaty with Germany was finished. They warned that failure to do so would create great resentment among the Japanese public. Wilson conferred that afternoon with Clemenceau and Lloyd George; the three leaders, who had hoped to postpone a decision on Shantung, recognized that they must give way to the Japanese demand. As Hankey put it, “It would be bad enough before handing over the German Treaty to lose the Italian Delegation, but if the fifth of the inviting Powers [Japan] had also withdrawn its representatives, the three remaining Powers responsible for the Treaty would be in a very awkward fix.” Lansing complained that the mood in Paris was one of “selfish materialism tinctured with a cynical disregard of manifest rights” and asked, “Will American idealism have to succumb to this evil spirit of a past era?”29
On the morning of April 22, Makino addressed the Council of Four to restate Japan’s claims. He also thoughtfully produced drafts of clauses for inclusion in the German treaty. Wilson appealed to Japan to consider the long-term interests of Asia and indeed of the world. Nations