861.00/5130: Telegram
The Ambassador in Japan (Morris), temporarily at Irkutsk, to the Secretary of State
[Received August 30, 1:17 p.m.]
Your May [August] 25, 6 p.m. reached me here at Irkutsk. I have fully realized that the plan set forth in my telegram of August 11th would probably be impracticable and in my last interview with Sukine53 I indicated to him very clearly my belief that our Government would not be in a position to send additional troops to Siberia. I also stated that any plan for economic assistance would require Congressional sanction and therefore involve considerable delay.
In view of the critical situation at Omsk, Government officers ask leave to withhold from the Kolchak government further definite statement of our attitude until the future of that Government is determined. I fear that any formal statement at this moment, if followed by the fall of Kolchak, might place on our Government responsibility for a result due to entirely different causes.
I leave Irkutsk today; will stop for a short time at Verkhniudinsk and Chita to study details of the Semionoff situation, and then proceed to Harbin to confer with Stevens. Please send messages for me in care consul at Harbin.
- John Sookine, Acting Minister of Foreign Affairs in the Omsk Government.↩