Office of the Historian

793.94/7461: Telegram

The Chargé in Japan (Neville) to the Secretary of State

Tokyo, December 2, 1935—noon.
[Received December 2—6:42 a.m.]

225. Department’s 185.64

1.
The British Chargé d’Affaires told me yesterday that the Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs had given him substantially the same outline of Japanese policy as was given to me (Embassy’s telegram No. 216, November 25, 6 p.m.) with the additional statement that [Page 460] in Japanese opinion Leith-Ross’ presence in China was being used by Nanking officials as a cover for political intrigues that have little or nothing to do with government finance. The British Chargé added that the Vice Minister made no reference to the Nine Power Treaty and although the Chargé brought up the subject the Vice Minister ignored it. The Japanese press has carried a number of acrimonious accounts of their interview (which according to the Chargé was cordial and pleasant) due to a rather provocative press message from London which stated that the British Embassy here had been instructed to take up the question of treaty violation and the protection of British interests.
2.
Some rather lurid accounts of events in China which apparently are believed by responsible Government officers here are current in official Japanese circles. These boil down to the following:
(a)
Chiang Kai-shek and his entourage have made enormous profits in recent weeks from transactions in silver and the announcement of the nationalization of silver was primarily a scheme to consolidate these gains.
(b)
Hesitation in declaring autonomy in North China has been due largely to hopes of Northern leaders that Chiang would divide some of his profits with them. This factor has made much trouble for the Japanese in the North.
(c)
The British through Leith-Ross have been giving support to these machinations perhaps unwittingly and without realizing the turpitude of the Nanking leaders.
(d)
C. T. Wang was induced by Chiang to board the steamship President Jefferson in an effort to enlist the sympathies of the Vice President and the congressional party on behalf of the so-called currency stabilization project and the general plans of the Nanking Government.
3.
The Embassy has no means of checking the truth of these reports but in any case it seems to the Embassy that while the Japanese are in their present frame of mind there is little that can be done by outside powers in North China. Assuming that there is a modicum of truth in the foregoing reports, it appears that the Japanese must be offering inducements to keep the North China autonomists in line.

Repeated to Peiping,

Neville
  1. November 29, 3 p.m., p. 454.↩