Office of the Historian

893.114 Narcotics/836: Telegram

The Counselor of Legation in China (Gauss) to the Secretary of State

Nanking, September 21, 1934—noon.
[Received 1:25 p.m.]

68. Reference my No. 67, September 17, 4 p.m.,27 regarding manufacture of narcotics. Further investigation and consultation with the Director of the National Health Administration has developed the following information: In 1929 the Chinese Government issued regulations for the establishment of a national agency to have a monopoly of all importation, distribution and sale of narcotics. The regulations were not put into effect, however, largely because of difficulties foreseen in their effective enforcement.

Recently the drastic action taken by Chiang Kai-shek28 for the suppression of unlawful narcotics traffic, involving in many cases infliction of the death penalty, has led to pressure for the establishment of the national agency to provide a lawful source of supply of narcotics for legitimate medicinal purposes.

The National Health Administration is preparing to give effect to the 1929 regulations by designating the Central Hygienic Laboratory at Nanking, one of the departments of the administration, as the national agency.

In this connection it has been proposed that instead of importing all narcotic supplies from abroad the national agency should make use of narcotics seized in the unlawful traffic in China. Heretofore these seized supplies have been destroyed. They are usually adulterated or impure and would require laboratory processing for refining or purification. [Page 371] This work would be undertaken by the national agency in its own laboratory plant which is under the strict control of the National Health Administration. The proposal to use such supplies has been approved by the Executive Yuan but has not yet been approved by the Central Political Council.29

Mail report follows.30

Gauss
  1. Not printed.↩
  2. Chairman of the Chinese Military Council and Commander in Chief of the Army, Navy, and Air Forces.↩
  3. Telegram No. 69, September 22, 1934, 9 a.m., from the Counselor of Legation in China, reported that “proposal to use seized drugs has now been approved by the Central Political Council” (893.114 Narcotics/838).↩
  4. Not printed.↩