File No. 893.00/2663
[Inclosure—Translation]
The Minister for Foreign
Affairs to Ambassador Sharp
Ministry for Foreign Affairs,
Paris,
June 14, 1917.
Mr. Ambassador: By a letter under date of
the 6th of this month your excellency was pleased to converse with
me of the opportunity which there would be for France, Great
Britain, Japan and the United States to make identic representations
to the Chinese Government expressing their regret at seeing fresh
discord arising in China and their hope of seeing a united and
responsible central Government reestablish and maintain harmony.
Returning to this question by your letter of the 13th of this month,
you were pleased to expound to me afresh the views with which the
Federal Government was inspired when it formulated the proposition
which I have just recalled.
Your Government estimates, in effect, that it is advisable that the
Allied Powers, to whom the military party at present in revolt in
China claims to belong dissociate their action from all idea of
revolt against the established
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Government in China, while the parliamentary party which today
mingles with the existing Government and which remains sympathetic
to the views of the Allies, desires only the establishment of a
Ministry favorable to the majority. It is to be feared that if the
military party triumph civil war will follow and that thus the cause
of the Allies will draw no benefit therefrom.
The Federal Government considers accordingly that identic
representations from the Allies would be able to have the happy
result of making all discord cease and of reuniting all the Chinese
factions into a grouping favorable to the cause of the Allies.
I have the honor to make known to your excellency that as early as
the 9th of this month I invited the French Ambassador to the United
States to make known to Mr. Lansing that the French Government was
ready to associate itself with the Government of the United States
in making to the Chinese Government an overture recommending to it
not to neglect any effort for preventing all disorder and for
establishing the desirable harmony in the interior and exterior
situation of China.
Mr. Jusserand was charged, on the one hand, to add that if the other
Powers consulted by the Federal Government were of the same mind,
conformable instructions would be addressed to the French Minister
at Peking, on the other to present the following observations
concerning the meaning of the proposed overture.
It did not, in fact, appear happy, as proposed in your excellency’s
letter of the 6th of this month, to say to the Chinese Govenment
that we consider the entry of China into the war against Germany as
of entirely secondary importance. From this point of view, it would
seem preferable to say that “if the Powers continue to attach a real
importance to the entry of China into the war against the Central
Powers, they wish before everything else the reestablishment of
order and of harmony in China, because they consider this as a
necessity essentially preliminary to any action of the Chinese
Government abroad.”
Moreover, the French Ambassador was charged with pointing out to Mr.
Lansing that it would appear opportune if the overture were to be
made, that Italy should be invited to take part. This Power is in
fact an Ally in the Great War and it seems that her interests in
China give her the right to be associated with the suggested
action.
Since the communication which I addressed to the French Ambassador at
Washington, I have learned that the Japanese Government and the
British Government did not show themselves at all favorable to the
proposed action. Nevertheless, according to a telegram from Mr.
Jusserand, dated the 9th of this month, the United States Minister
at Peking is said, for his part, to have taken the identical step
proposed without waiting longer.
Under these conditions, while renewing the assurance that the French
Government is, on its part, disposed to join in a measure which
would meet with unanimous concurrence, I would be very much obliged
to your excellency to be good enough to confirm to your Government
the sense of the communication which the French Ambassador was
charged to make to it on the 9th of this month.
I am [etc.]
