702.9411/2611½
The Chinese Ambassador (Hu Shih) to the Secretary of State
My Dear Mr. Secretary: I wish to take this opportunity to thank you once more for the very profitable and stimulating hour which you so kindly gave me the other morning. I have since been thinking over the subject-matter of our conversation of last Friday.96 Because of the importance of the questions involved, I have here jotted down a few thoughts and am submitting them to you for your wise criticism.
Our conversation, as you will recall, turned to a speculation as to whether some attempt could be made to wean Japan from Axis partnership and render her more innocuous in the Pacific during the present world crisis.
I am sincerely afraid that any serious attempt in such a direction would have to involve a surrender of the principles for which the Anglo-Saxon peoples have been fighting, and I am inclined to think that even such a complete surrender (which will irretrievably damage the spirit and morale of the fighting democracies) will not make Japan really desert the Axis powers. The Tripartite Alliance of last September has received the sanction of the Japanese Emperor in an Imperial Rescript, and cannot be easily discarded. It is not merely “the Matsuoka policy”, but represents a more fundamental affinity of national outlook.
[Page 226]There was a time when Japan seemed to feel genuinely resentful towards Germany and Italy. That was after the signing of the Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact of August 1939.97 In her resentment, some of Japan’s leaders actually declared the Anti-Comintern Pact (1936) “dead”.
But the military successes of Germany in 1940 changed all this. Japan gladly became a partner and an ally of Germany and Italy. And she will not abandon this Imperially sanctioned Alliance so long as Hitler is victorious and successful and so long as the Japanese militaristic and pro-Axis clique is not discredited.
So far two things—and two things only,—have prevented Japan from going to the aid of her European partners: First, the war in China has bogged down her millions of troops and service men and has tied up hundreds of her ships for the transport of troops and for keeping these troops supplied. And, secondly, the presence of the American fleet in the Pacific has made Japan hesitate either to carry out her “southward advance”, or to raid the commerce and cut the supply lines for the British Commonwealths as well as for China.
I am reasonably sure that, as long as China fights on and a sufficiently strong portion of the American fleet is maintained in the Pacific, there will not be active and effective Japanese assistance to the Axis powers in the Pacific.
But, if Japan is freed from her war in China or from the danger of being effectively flanked by the American fleet, then no amount of appeasement, nor any Japanese pledge can stop Japan from playing the role of an active partner of the Axis powers and completely cutting off Australia and New Zealand from participation in the war in Africa and Asia, as well as effectively intercepting all material supplies from the United States and Canada.
I am therefore compelled to conclude that, if the problem is how to render Japan incapable or ineffectual as an Axis partner, the best solution seems to lie in assisting China to continue to a successful ending her war of resistance to Japanese aggression, and in maintaining a firm diplomatic and naval position in the Pacific.
You were kind enough, my dear Mr. Secretary, to inform me that in recent months there had been numerous informal suggestions, largely from Japanese sources, to the effect that an early termination of the Sino-Japanese war might be brought about through some form of mediation by the United States Government.
I have for years speculated about the possibilities and difficulties of a mediated peace for the ending of the Sino-Japanese war. Since our conversation last Friday, I have again thought over this question. [Page 227] It is my humble opinion that Sino-Japanese peace through American mediation seems quite impossible at this time.
There are at least these unsurmountable difficulties:
- (1)
- The military leaders of Japan have repeatedly declared that “the dispute between China and Japan is purely a two-party conflict, not to be settled by the intervention or mediation of a third party”. Such a statement was made on September 29, 1939. It was repeated in Tokyo and Shanghai only a few days ago. And in an official statement issued on May 24, 1941, by the Imperial Headquarters through Colonel Hayao Mabuchi, Chief of its Information Section, all attempts to seek peace between Japan and the National Government of China were condemned as mistaken views of the “peace brokers”. The same statement goes on to say that “the key to the solution of the ‘incident’ is for the imperial forces to knock out the enemy forces and destroy Chungking’s power of resistance.”
- (2)
- While Japan may seriously desire an early ending of the war in China, she only wants to end it on her own terms. All talk about a general withdrawal of Japanese troops from China seems empty play of words. She will not voluntarily withdraw from Manchuria, nor from the Inner Mongolian provinces, nor from North China, nor from the coastal centres of industry and commerce, nor from such strategic areas as the Hainan Island which is being used as an important base for Japan’s Southward expansion. In short, the militarist caste of Japan has not been sufficiently discredited to be willing to seek a just peace. Even the “peace brokers” do not dare to offer anything approaching a just peace.
- (3)
- Such being Japan’s real desire, it will be utterly impossible for the American Government to sponsor, either directly or indirectly, any settlement conforming to that desire. No leader of a democratic government can afford to sponsor such a peace.
- (4)
- For years the Government of the United States has been trying to use its diplomacy and its great economic and naval power to bring Japan to a more reasonable point of view. But recent German military successes and British reverses have tended to make the Japanese military more unreasonable than ever before. Any waivering on the part of the Anglo-Saxon democracies in dealing with Japan now will be naturally interpreted by her military as a sign of weakness and will only strengthen their faith in the ultimate triumph of brute force.
- (5)
- The history of the Peace of Munich clearly shows that even a peace solemnly signed by the heads of four great European Governments became a worthless scrap of paper in less than six months. Can a mediated peace in the Far East have better and more effective guarantees or sanctions?
I have enumerated these difficulties, my dear Mr. Secretary, in the sincere hope that a frank recognition of these implications may be helpful in any comprehensive consideration of the question of terminating the Sino-Japanese War through a mediated peace.
With renewed assurances [etc.]