761.94/1170: Telegram
The Ambassador in France (Bullitt) to the Secretary of State
[Received 8 p.m.]
2879. I communicated the contents of the first two paragraphs of your 1463, November 30, 4 p.m. to Chauvel this afternoon. He was most grateful for the communication.
Chauvel said that he would send a telegram this afternoon to the French Ambassador in Tokyo requesting him to formulate and state at once to Ambassador Grew the exact facts and fears which had motivated the identic communication of the three Ambassadors to their respective Governments.
Chauvel added that he would be extremely grateful if in the future when our Government took any action in the Far East an explanation of such action might be communicated to him through me. He stressed the intense concentration of the higher officers of the Quai d’Orsay on the affairs of Europe and his need for information which would assist him to keep French policy in line with our policy.
Chauvel went on to say that his most recent information led him to believe that the present Japanese-Russian negotiations might lead to a temporary solution of the perennial question of the fisheries and to an agreement with regard to the oil of Sakhalin, and a number of polite words; but that in reality there would be no real cooperation between the Soviet Government and the Japanese Government.
He said that his latest information from China indicated that the chief obstacle to the setting up of a so-called Chinese Government under Wang Ching Wei was the refusal of Wang Ching Wei to form a government until the Japanese should be ready to hand over to his government control of the Chinese customs and the Salt Gabelle and to withdraw their forces from the entire Yangtze Valley.
He stated most confidentially that representatives of the French Government were in intimate touch with Wang Ching Wei and were convinced that, although pretending to work with the Japanese Government, he was in reality working against the Japanese Government in his own way.
Chauvel said that the Japanese Government would not accede to these demands of Wang Ching Wei because the Japanese Government realized that as soon as the Japanese troops should be withdrawn from the Yangtze Valley the troops of Chiang Kai Shek would enter it.
It was possible of course that some sort of a compromise finally would be made by Wang Ching Wei and the Japanese Government but he felt certain that such a compromise could lead only to great [Page 91] difficulties between the government which Wang Ching Wei might set up.
It was asserted that if a government set up by Wang Ching Wei should begin again to pay the interest on international loans secured on the revenues turned over to his government the French and British would accept these payments.
Personally he felt that the only great danger which might arise to French and British interests in China was the danger that the present Japanese Government should be overthrown and be replaced by militarists and would push the Tientsin question ruthlessly.
Personally he thought that the question of Tientsin should be liquidated and that the question of Chinese funds in Tientsin should be solved by turning over these funds to the Belgian Bank in Tientsin. He had been informed that Craigie, British Ambassador in Tokyo, had negotiated a compromise with the Japanese Government on the subject of Chinese currency in Tientsin.
If these two questions should be got out of the way there will not be much excuse for the Japanese to take violent action in the Tientsin area.
He said that his latest information from Chungking on the Nanning situation was to the effect that the city had been taken by the Japanese but that Chiang Kai Shek expected to make successful counterattack in the near future. On the other hand his information from Indo-China was to the effect that the Japanese had been stopped in the suburbs of Nanning and had never been able to take the city.
In any event the use of the roadbed from Indo-China to Nanning for the truck transport was now impossible and it seemed to him inadvisable for the French Government at the present moment to send rails for the completion of the railroad on the existing roadbed.
In conclusion he felt that no matter what words might be used by the Russians the Japanese Government would remain extremely skeptical with regard to the future actions of the Soviet Government. The Japanese Government moreover would probably be equally skeptical with regard to its future relations with any government which Wang Ching Wei might set up.
He felt therefore that the moment was not an unfavorable one from the point of view of the United States for negotiations with Japan.
Wellington Koo6 has just stated to me that his information indicates that there is no truth in the report of the Domei agency that the Soviet Government has stopped exports of arms to the Chinese Government.
- Chinese Ambassador in France.↩