793.94/11631: Telegram
The Ambassador in Germany (Dodd) to the Secretary of State
[Received December 14—12:35 p.m.]
294. For the President. The Russian representative here said to me yesterday that all democratic countries wished his country to save China. He added that his Government would do nothing except in cooperation with the United States and England.
Today the news from the Far East is worse than ever and I have read your and Secretary Hull’s statements as to Japanese brutality.25 The Japanese Ambassador here boasted a day or two ago of his country’s having killed 500,000 Chinese people. The facts of today and the statements that have been made show that no positive action is expected on the part of the United States and England. This simply means that the policy of Mussolini and Hitler is expected to be applied to the world and what a sad result that would be.
If an opinion may be offered I simply say that the United States needs to apply a boycott to Japan. England should cooperate to save herself. If that did not produce prompt effects the American Navy should move toward the Far East with a few British war vessels. If either of these moves were made Mussolini would threaten England, but I believe the Italian people would refuse to fight with America, Germany might threaten moves for Japan but the German people are so much opposed that war would not be made. I think, therefore, that you and Congress can save modern civilization again. This time even without a great war. But continued delay means the loss of democratic civilization.
- A reference to the sinking of the U. S. S. Panay; see vol. iv, pp. 485 ff., and Foreign Relations, Japan, 1931–1941, vol. i, pp. 517 ff.↩