File No. 861.00/2542½

Memorandum of a Conversation between the Third Assistant Secretary of State (Long) and the Chinese Minister (Koo)

The Chinese Minister called to-day and stated that he was just in receipt of information to the effect that the Japanese had moved 12,000 troops along the line of the Chinese Eastern Railroad, and had stationed them as follows: Harbin, 6,000; Buchta[sic?], 3,000; and Manchouli, 3,000; but his Government had not been consulted by the Japanese under the terms of the military convention they had made with Japan. Under the terms of the convention the only excuse for Japanese military action along the line of the Trans-Siberian Railroad in China was that there should be claim by China for the project, or that there should exist an emergency; that no emergency existed.

He further stated that 1,700 Chinese troops had been ordered to proceed to Vladivostok and that the Japanese on the railroad running north from Mukden had prevented all but 950 from proceeding.

He asked what steps this Government was going to take under the circumstances.

I told him that we would consider, but that the present circumstances probably would not have resulted if his Government had acted on the advice of our Government some months ago and had assumed control of the Trans-Siberian Railroad within Chinese territory.

His reply was that “control” was a word not susceptible of exact definition but that the facts were that there were 40,000 Chinese troops in Heilungkiang Province, part of whom were on the railroad running from Manchouli to Harbin; that there was no disorder, or none had been reported along the line of the railroad; that the “control” which the Chinese exercised over that part of the railroad would seem to have been sufficient to protect it. He did not know the exact location or disposition or composition of the 40,000 but that they were one and one-half divisions of their peace strength. He said that it had been reported that the Chinese commander in chief had had some friendly intercourse with the commanding officer of the Bolsheviki troops when they approached Chinese territory in pursuit of Semenov. He denied that this was true except that the commander had warned them not to penetrate Chinese territory.

Breckinridge Long