The Japanese further invoked another and later agreement, which was, they alleged, signed by the Chinese without demur.[252] This accord, coming after the entry of China into the war, was tantamount to the renunciation of any rights which China might have believed she possessed as a corollary of her belligerency.  It also disposed, the Japanese argued, of her contention that the territory in question is indispensable and vital to her—­a contention which Japan met with the promise to deliver it up—­and which was invalidated by China’s refusal to fight for it in the year 1914.  This latter argument was controverted by the Chinese assertion that they were ready and willing to declare war against Germany at the outset, but that their co-operation was refused by the Entente, and subsequently by Japan.  This allegation is credible, if we remember the eagerness exhibited by the British government that Japan should lose no time in co-operating with her allies, the representations made by the British Ambassador to Baron Kato on the subject,[253] and the alleged motive to prevent the retrocession of Shantung to China by the German government.

The arguments of China and Japan were summarily put in the following questions by a delegate of each country:  “Yes or no, does Kiaochow, whose population is exclusively Chinese, form an integral part of the Chinese state?  Yes or no, was Kiaochow brutally occupied by the Kaiser in the teeth of right and justice and to the detriment of the peace of the Far East, and it may be of the world?  Yes or no, did Japan enter the war against the aggressive imperialism of the German Empire, and for the purpose of arranging a lasting peace in the Far East?  Yes or no, was Kiaochow captured by the English and Japanese troops in 1914 with the sole object of destroying a dangerous naval base?  Yes or no, was China’s co-operation against Germany, which was advocated and offered by President Yuan Shi Kai in August, 1914, refused at the instigation of Japan?"[254]

The Japanese catechism ran thus:  “Yes or no, was Kiaochow a German possession in the year 1914?  Yes or no, was the world, including the United States, a consenting party to the occupation of that province by the Germans?  Why did China, who to-day insists that that port is indispensable to her, cede it to Germany?  Why in 1914 did she make no effort to recover it, but leave this task to the Japanese army?  Further, who can maintain that juridically the last war abolished ipso facto all the cessions of territory previously effected?  Turkey formerly ceded Cyprus to Great Britain.  Will it be argued that this cession is abrogated and that Cyprus must return to Turkey directly and unconditionally?  The Conference announced repeatedly that it took its stand on justice and the welfare of the peoples.  It is in the name of the welfare of the peoples, as well as in the name of justice, that we assert our right to take over Kiaochow.  The harvest to him whose hands soweth the seed."[255]