Office of the Historian

793.94/2821: Telegram

The Chargé in France (Shaw) to the Secretary of State

Paris, November 23, 1931—1 p.m. [a.m.]
[Received November 22—10:50 p.m.]

781. From Ambassador Dawes: Doctor Sze circulated this evening the following memorandum addressed to all members of the Council other than China and Japan.

“In order to remove all possibility of misunderstanding I deem it my duty to place before you the following considerations affecting yesterday’s proposals for the appointment of a commission of inquiry.

1.
In the present emergency [In principle] there can be no objection to a properly constituted commission to investigate and report upon the existing situation in Manchuria. Indeed it is a step which might well have been taken 2 months ago had not Japan refused to entertain the suggestion.
2.
I beg, however, to point out that the creation at this juncture of such a commission, however constituted and whatever the scope of its activity might be, is a purely illusory proposal unless it is based upon a simultaneous effective disposition covering the immediate needs of a situation which brooks no further delay. To put the matter more concretely, inquiry, without at the same time providing for immediate cessation of hostilities and for the withdrawal of Japanese forces (such withdrawal to begin at once and proceed progressively to prompt completion), becomes a mere device to condone and perpetuate for a more or less indefinite period the unjustifiable occupation of China’s territory by an aggressor who has already virtually attained his unlawful objective while these discussions have been going on.
3.
In the circumstances you will readily see that as I tried to make plain at yesterday’s meeting of the Council it is quite impossible for me to consider the proposal in question or to participate in working out the details connected with it until the bases above mentioned have been adequately laid down.

China still sincerely hopes for a genuine solution of the problem at the hands of the Council but she can hardly be expected seriously to [Page 539] visualize proposals that ignore and evade the essential factors which lie at the very foundation of her appeal to the League of Nations.”

  • [Dawes]
  • Shaw