793.94/9329: Telegram
The Ambassador in China (Johnson) to the Secretary of State
Nanking, August 12, 1937—6
p.m.
[Received 8:45 p.m.]
[Received 8:45 p.m.]
410. My 405 [403], August 11, noon [midnight].
- 1.
- When the collective note to the Minister for Foreign Affairs was delivered to him August 11, 9 p.m., he appeared greatly perturbed over the crisis at Shanghai and in general. He said that it had always been the desire of the Chinese Government to exclude Shanghai from the zone of hostilities and that orders had in fact been issued to that end. He said that the prospect of war was “horrible, horrible”; that information from Japan reported preparations to send 500,000 troops to China and that in addition to the score of Japanese vessels which had reached Shanghai that day numerous other naval vessels were stationed all along the coast. On returning to the Embassy after delivering the note, Peck telephoned to Dr. Wang by urgent request and the latter told him in apparent agitation that his oral remarks were not a reply to the note but that the Chinese high military authorities would draft the reply and that its nature would be partly determined by the attitude of the Japanese.
- 2.
- It is evident that Wang is personally vacillating between a policy of yielding to Japan, prompted by his realization of and extreme repugnance to the disasters that will inevitably follow armed resistance, and his loyalty to the official position of the Chinese Government that no further yielding is compatible with China’s continued existence. I feel that indecision between these two policies is typical of Chinese thinking minds generally.
- 3.
- The struggle between Japan and China ramifies into psychological, political and economic fields which are obscure. Although there can be therefore no infallible appraisal of its causes or outcome I [Page 386] hesitatingly but from a sense of obligation submit my opinion that the Japanese military faction is forcing Japan along a road of compulsory piecemeal domination of China (See Tokyo’s 252, August 7, 2 p.m.) and that any offer of good offices to the two countries should carefully avoid any implied advice to China to yield to Japan. It is my opinion that nothing can save China from the necessity of deciding sooner or later whether to oppose Japanese aggression with force or sink to the condition of a vassal state. If these are in fact the only alternatives open to China, there is a probability any appearance of urging China to purchase peace with the loss of sovereign rights would appear to be encouragement to a predatory national policy on Japan’s part of a sort condemned by the pact against war, by various treaties, and, as late as July 16, by your statement of American policy.84
- 4.
- If serious hostilities occur between Japan and China, they will inflict untold damage on China and possibly Japan, but they may correct in China a tendency to rely on foreign aid and in Japan a belief in the profitable results of imperialist expansion.
- 5.
- In conclusion I believe a compromise truce at this juncture would merely postpone the inevitable decision whether China shall be dominated by Japan without resistance, and the urging of such a compromise by the United States would seriously impair the public stand we have taken against war and against violation of international agreements. It would follow from this conclusion that any representations to either party should be carefully noncommittal in regard to the fundamental issue and should be strictly confined to safeguarding of American interests unless frankly made on behalf of humanity or international morality.
Johnson