893.00/11–2948
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Chief of the Division of Chinese Affairs (Sprouse)
| Participants: | Sir Oliver S. Franks, British Ambassador |
| Mr. F. R. Hoyer Millar, British Minister | |
| The Under Secretary | |
| Mr. Palmer–AF93 | |
| Mr. Sprouse–CA |
The British Ambassador called by appointment today and asked if there were any new developments with respect to China.
I informed him that there had been nothing beyond what I had previously told him, that we continued to support the National Government and that we were continuing to implement our aid program authorized by the last Congress for a period ending April 3, 1949. I pointed out that in the fighting during the past two months in China the National Government had suffered serious losses in manpower and matériel, the amount of such losses in some items being considerably greater than the total of these items being acquired by the Chinese Government under the present program of aid for China. I described the pattern of defections of Chinese Government troops to the Communists and pointed out that the will to fight had been lacking on the part of the National Government forces.
In this general connection Mr. Sprouse pointed out that the defection of many of the National Government troops had made untenable the position of the remaining forces which might have desired to resist the Communists. He added that the recent battles in the Hsuchow–Nanking area had, however, been somewhat different and that the National Government troops had actually shown a will to fight.
I made a brief reference to the impending visit of Madame Chiang, stating that she was likely to seek to obtain commitments for largescale aid from the United States. I pointed out that it was difficult for the American Government to make any public statement of its policy at this time since to make a full and accurate statement of the situation would be harmful to the position of the Generalissimo and his Government and to make a misleading statement would obviously be unfair to the American people. The United States’ Government was therefore saying nothing.
The Ambasador expressed his appreciation of this indication of the United States position in China and said that he would have [Page 222] Mr. Graves94 keep in touch with the appropriate officers of the Department in connection with developments in China.