Foreign Relations of the United States Diplomatic Papers, 1941, The Far East, Volume IV

711.93/481½

Mr. Lauchlin Currie, Administrative Assistant to President Roosevelt, to the Secretary of State

Washington, November 25, 1941.

I have just received a cable from Owen Lattimore⁸³ in which he tells me that the Generalissimo is greatly agitated by the report from the Chinese Ambassador following his conference with you. Lattimore makes a point that Chiang Kai-shek’s reliance on America is the foundation of his whole national policy and that this would be destroyed by any loosening of economic pressure or unfreezing on our part while leaving Japan entrenched in China. He draws an analogy to the closing of the Burma Road, which permanently destroyed British prestige in China. Lattimore remarked that he had never really seen Chiang Kai-shek agitated before.

83. Infra; Mr. Lattimore was American Political Adviser to Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek.