861.00/9080½
Notes Prepared by Mr. Robert Lansing Concerning Certain Phases of the Negotiations and Conversations Relating to Military Intervention in Siberia in 1918
The following statements are made up from my private notes and from my personal correspondence.
In January, 1918, the disorders which threatened Vladivostok were so serious that the British and Japanese Governments, at the request of the Consuls at that port, dispatched war vessels to protect foreign residents and their property. At a conference of the American Ambassador at Tokio with the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs about January 15th the latter stated that, in case it became necessary on account of the political unrest to occupy Vladivostok and the Chinese Eastern Railway and the Amur branch, Japan asked to do this alone, and that a definite request to this effect had been made upon Great Britain. This same attitude of opposition to any joint military action was emphasized by a message to the President from the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs delivered orally to the Counselor for the Department by an American citizen on January 24th, in which the Minister expressed the hope that the Government of the United States would not send troops to Vladivostok or Harbin for the purpose of keeping order as such a course would “create a very unfavorable impression in Japan.”76
The President was much disturbed by this attitude of the Japanese Government and the Division of Far Eastern Affairs openly opposed it suggesting that an international commission ought to handle the matter, thus avoiding jealousies and suspicions.
Sometime prior to February 24th the Allied Governments decided to withhold consent to Japanese intervention in Siberia, a decision which the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs told the American [Page 394] Ambassador that he deplored since it was becoming increasingly necessary and Japan had made all the preparations to act immediately.77
Subsequent interviews on February 27th with the British and French Ambassadors78 disclosed that by that time the question as to military intervention in Siberia had reached the stage of deciding whether Japan should be requested by the Allies to intervene or should be allowed to proceed independently. That Japan would send troops to Vladivostok and Harbin seemed to be an accepted fact.
In the circumstances the President decided that it was useless to oppose intervention by Japan and notified the Allied Governments that the United States had no objection to a request being made by them upon Japan to act in Siberia, but that the United States could not for certain reasons join with them in such request. This was on March 1, 1918.79 Four days later Tokio was notified of the view of the Government of the United States that Japan should declare that, if she intervened in Siberia, she would do so only as an ally of Russia.80
This message was shown to the British French and Italian Ambassadors before it was sent. The Italian Ambassador stated that his Government held that a condition to their consent to intervention had been and still was that “action should not be by Japan alone.”
On March 24th I wrote to the President81 reviewing the chaotic state of affairs in Siberia and said “that in view of these facts I do not see how Japan could be expected to refrain from taking military measures.” I stated that the question now presented was “whether Japan alone or the Powers arrayed against Germany acting jointly should constitute the expeditionary force.” Two days later the President advised me orally that he was not prepared to change the policy adopted, which was against military intervention. This I think was due to the opposition of his military advisers who throughout were hostile to intervention.
Both the British and French Governments were at the time strongly advocating intervention in Siberia, as well as in other parts of Russia, and early in April the French Ambassador advised me82 that the American, French and Italian Ambassadors at Vologda had reached the following conclusions:
“1st. That Japanese intervention was more than ever necessary to Combat Germany.
[Page 395]“2nd. That it will only work its full effect if it bears the character of an inter-allied participation.”
The French Government urged the cooperation of the United States in the expedition “even though it were merely nominal”.
On April 25th Lord Reading advocated coöperation in Siberian intervention,83 asserting that, if Japan acted alone, it would result in a large proportion of the Russian population going over to Germany. He pointed out how the Allies could operate at Murmansk and in Southern Russia but stated that the important step would be an advance through Siberia by a force predominantly Japanese and American. He then asked if the President would be disposed to agree to the sending of an American force to the Far East.
As the British plan contemplated the uniting of various Russian factions against Germany in order to make effective the economic blockade of that country, its feasibility did not appeal to the President.
On April 29th in an interview with the Japanese Ambassador84 the Ambassador said to me in reply to a question as to the participation of the United States or of the Allies in a military expedition in the event that intervention in Siberia became necessary, that he personally would welcome it, and that he believed his Government would hold the same opinion, and that it was evident that the presence at least of troops of the United States, Japan and China would go far to remove the suspicion of the Russians as to the purpose of territorial conquest which might be inferred if Japan acted alone. He was asked to obtain authority from his Government to say this. He said that he would.
On May 16th the American Ambassador at Tokio informed the Department85 that the Japanese General Staff in view of information received from the Japanese Ambassador at Washington were advocating a plan of Allied intervention under Japanese command.
While Japan had evidently ceased to object to joint action in Siberia, the President had not approved uniting with Allied Governments in requesting Japan to engage in an interallied expedition for the question was a subject of discussion with Lord Reading on May 20th.
In the early part of June reports arrived that the Czecho-Slovak forces in western Siberia were endeavoring to make their way to Vladivostok. Later, about June 20th, came the report that the Bolsheviks were opposing this movement and that the refugees had been compelled to fight the Red Guards along the Siberian Railway. On [Page 396] the 23rd I wrot the President86 that this seemed to me to create a new condition in the problem of intervention in Siberia, and that means of giving the Czechs support should be considered.
On June 26th Viscount Ishii read to me a cablegram from his Government and later sent me a paraphrase of it which is as follows:
[Here follows copy of cablegram handed to the Secretary of State by the Japanese Ambassador, June 26, 1918, printed on page 365.]
A conference was held at the White House on July 6th in regard to the Siberian situation. An extract from my notes as to the Conference reads as follows:
[Here follow Secretary Lansing’s notes on the conference as printed in Foreign Relations, 1918, Russia, volume II, pages 262–263.]
On the 8th I had an interview with the Japanese Ambassador, which I recorded in my private memoranda:
[Here follows Secretary Lansing’s memorandum of his interview with the Japanese Ambassador as printed in Foreign Relations, 1918, Russia, volume II, pages 267–268.]
The day following this interview the British, French and Italian Ambassadors called upon me,87 and Lord Reading, as spokesman, said that they wished to know whether the Allied Governments were not to take part in the initial landing of troops at Vladivostok or whether it was the purpose to confine the enterprise to Japanese and American troops.
I replied that the matter had not been discussed because it seemed useless to go into details until the Japanese had approved the general plan, but that we had always intended to lay the matter before the Allied Governments and to advise with them provided the Japanese accepted our program.
On July 24th the Counselor of the Department, the acting Secretary of State during my absence from Washington, sent me a copy of the following letter which he had addressed to the President, in which he detailed a conference that he had had that afternoon with the Japanese Ambassador:
[Here follows Acting Secretary Polk’s letter of July 24, 1918, to President Wilson as printed in Foreign Relations, 1918, Russia, volume II, pages 301–302, together with its enclosure as described, ibid., page 302, footnote 1.]
- See letter of Jan. 24, 1918, from the Acting Secretary of State to President Wilson, p. 351.↩
- See Foreign Relations, 1918, Russia, vol. ii, p. 56.↩
- See letter of Feb. 27, 1918, to President Wilson, ante, p. 353.↩
- See ante, p. 355.↩
- See Foreign Relations, 1918, Russia, vol. ii, p. 67.↩
- See ante, p. 357.↩
- See Foreign Relations, 1918, Russia, vol. ii, p. 109.↩
- See ibid., p. 135.↩
- See ibid., p. 144.↩
- Ibid., p. 162.↩
- Ante, p. 364.↩
- See Foreign Relations, 1918, Russia, vol. ii, p. 269.↩