Mr. Townsend to Mr. Hay.
Brussels, February 16, 1904.
Sir: I have the honor to confirm my cable of this day.
The above cable is the result of my consultation to-day with the minister for foreign affairs. He informed me that he was prepared to accept our propositions in principle, but with certain restrictions, as he understood it had been so accepted by the other powers. He desired to know what our position was in relation to Manchuria—whether we excluded that province in contemplating the neutrality of China and its administrative “whole.”
[Page 97]I informed him that my understanding of our proposition as set forth in Department’s cable of 10th instant was that it contained a general principle promulgated exclusively for the benefit of the world at large, and with the sole desire of preventing the possible spread of war and bloodshed throughout China, and at the same time offering a possible protection to the commerce of the neutral powers of the world. I explained to the minister, who does not speak English, that the wording of the proposition did not show a desire on the part of my Government to define the limits of the Chinese Empire or any of its provinces, that the expression “administrative entity of China” did not necessarily mean the integrity of China, but rather the existant administrative condition of China, that the delicate position of Manchuria being perhaps a “casus belli” was one that naturally my Government would not touch upon.
He accepted this view of the proposition and informed me that instructions in this sense would be immediately forwarded to the Belgian representatives at St. Petersburg, Tokyo, and Peking.
I have, etc.,