Office of the Historian

793.94/6289: Telegram

The Standing Committee of the Southwest Political Council at Canton to the Secretary of State47

Canton, May 19, 1933—[5 p.m.?]
[Received 5:22 a.m.]

The Southwest Political Council is constrained to address this communication to the League of Nations, which is seized of the Sino-Japanese dispute relating to Manchuria, and to the signatories of the Nine-Power Treaty which guarantees the territorial sovereignty and administrative integrity of the Chinese Republic, as well as to the Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics as a signatory of the Sino-Soviet agreement of 1924.

2.
The Chinese people as a whole are irrevocably opposed to any compromise or agreement with Japan based on Chinese recognition of the Japanese-created state of Manchukuo. Manchuria together with Jehol is an integral and vital part of the Chinese Republic whose territory is one and indivisible; and for this reason among others, the tearing away of Manchuria and Jehol cannot be suffered by China save at the risk of such material and moral enfeeblement that her survival as an independent and sovereign state would become a matter of incalculable difficulty.
3.
This Council is informed that negotiations are in train between agents of the Japanese General Staff, which is the real government of Japan, and emissaries of the Nanking Military Commission, to which the government at Nanking is entirely subservient, for a settlement of the dispute relating to Manchuria including Jehol on terms not only inconsistent with the League of Nations’ resolution condemning Japanese policy and action in Manchuria as well as with the provisions of the Nine-Power Treaty but in utter disregard of the vital interests of China as a self-respecting and independent country.
4.
The terms under negotiation include the following:
(a)
The Japanese Government considered it impossible to demand the Chinese National Government to recognize the independence of Manchukuo, but hopes that the Chinese Government will, from the commencement of negotiation, effectively stop all activities toward disturbing the peace of Manchukuo and will consider the Manchukuo Government as de facto. To ensure everlasting peace between China and Japan, these two Governments will mutually agree to include provinces north of the Yellow River as “non-war” area.
(b)
The Chinese Government will give full guarantee that the boycott of Japanese goods will not be a measure of national policy.
(c)
Should the foregoing two principles be agreed to, the Japanese Government will voluntarily abolish unilateral treaties, and will surrender all rights and privileges pertaining to concessions, extraterritoriality and river navigation, and will further proceed to conclude treaties with the Chinese Government on equal and reciprocal basis with a common object of maintaining an “Asiatic Monroe Doctrine”.
5.
A fourth term is also under negotiation which pledges the Japanese Government to give “the Chinese Government every assistance economically, financially and militarily” in order (according to one version) “to suppress Red bandits” but, according to another version, to enable the Nanking Military Commission to suppress other military forces in China.
6.
The real meaning of the foregoing terms is clear. Not only must the Chinese Government agree to a de facto recognition of Manchukuo and thus in effect consent to the permanent severance of Manchuria and Jehol from China but Japan is to extend over the rest of China the system of “cooperation” which the Japanese General Staff and its agents are working out in Manchukuo. It is hardly necessary to emphasize the danger to the Chinese people and the menace to the world involved in these terms.
7.
As there does not exist political machinery enabling the Chinese people to effect (otherwise than by civil war) a change of government in Nanking in order to mark their opposition to the aforesaid terms, it devolves on the Southwest Political Council as a duly constituted and nationally recognized political organ, first, to register [Page 336] the nation’s opposition to the negotiations now in train between the agents of the Japanese General Staff and the Nanking Military Commission or its emissaries whether or not the said negotiations are being conducted, at this stage, with the knowledge of the members of the Government at Nanking; and, secondly, to inform the League of Nations and the friendly powers to whom this communication is addressed that the Chinese people will refuse to recognize the validity of any agreement which the Government at Nanking may be coerced to conclude with the Japanese Government in violation of Chinese territorial sovereignty and administrative integrity in Manchuria and Jehol and in contradiction with the terms of the League of Nations’ resolution relating to the Manchurian question as well as with the provisions of the Nine-Power Treaty.
Tong Shao-yi

Shao Fu-sheng

Tang Chak-yue

Chan Chi-tong

Li Chung-yen

Chau Lu

Members of the Standing Committee of the Southwest Political Council, Canton
  1. This communication was filed without acknowledgment.↩