793.94/4787: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Consul General at Shanghai (Cunningham)
103. For the Minister. Your March 16, 9 a.m., paragraph 2, and March 16, 9 p.m.
1. I share your feeling that the evacuated area should be turned directly back by the Japanese to the Chinese. However, confronted with the problem which the actual situation presents, it may be essential to give some practical assistance toward making possible the liquidation of the present military situation.
2. The American Government has not committed itself to participation in maintenance of order in the evacuated zone. I have throughout taken the position that I would make no commitments on this subject, which is primarily one for consideration by the men on the spot familiar with the problem, until I had received recommendations from you.
Referring to the Assembly’s Resolution of March 11, part II, third paragraph, you will note that the League asks “member powers … if necessary to cooperate in maintaining order in the evacuated zone”. In acknowledging Drummond’s letter to Wilson of March 11, this [Page 594] Government indicated that it was prepared to cooperate toward bringing about definitive cessation of hostilities and withdrawal of the “Japanese forces; but it did not specify that that cooperation would take the form of participation in the policing of an evacuated area. I had expressed to Wilson before and I expressed to him on March 11, by telephone, the view that the question of the form which cooperation should take was one which should be considered at Shanghai. I authorized him to let my view be known to responsible persons.
3. The position taken by the Assembly of the League and by this Government has been that hostilities must be terminated and Japan’s armed forces must be withdrawn. It stands to reason that in process of the Japanese withdrawal some arrangement should be made to prevent contact between the Japanese troops as they withdraw and the Chinese troops. There would probably need to be an agreement by China not to advance its forces during that withdrawal. It would possibly assist the observance of that agreement if the neutral powers furnished observers in the evacuated territory during the withdrawal, but I see, as you do, serious objections to any attempt by the neutral powers to hold in force such a large territory as that to be evacuated, and I feel that the whole question is one on which the first recommendation should come from you and your conferees at Shanghai.
4. It is further to be expected that the Japanese will resist any proposal which would permit after the Japanese withdrawal reoccupation by Chinese troops of the whole area from which the Japanese shall have withdrawn. It occurs to me that this might be taken care of by a pledge by China that Chinese soldiers shall not come within the area of the municipality of Greater Shanghai together with adequate assurances by the authorities of that municipality that the policing of the area within the municipality of Greater Shanghai by Chinese police shall be effective against violent anti-foreign activity of any kind. If an attempt to secure an agreement on this should reach an impasse, I should then be glad to have your recommendations as to whether any practical contribution can be made by the use of neutral military forces.
5. This problem as a whole is one which, in my opinion, can only be worked out by you and the other representatives on the spot. You should resist any efforts on the part of Japan or other powers to advance self-interests on the basis of the military situation. But you should be prepared to offer the cooperation of your Government and its agencies for assistance in connection with measures which may seem to you necessary and pertinent to and restricted to steps taken in liquidation of that situation. This, in line with what I have said above, I authorize you to do. This will require the working out by [Page 595] you and your colleagues who represent neutral powers of some plan which will meet the exigencies of the problem.