893.51/2101: Telegram
The Minister in China (Reinsch) to the Acting Secretary of State
[Received January 24, 12.43 a.m.]
My telegram of January 16, 7 p.m. Japanese Minister now specifically informs me that in conversation with Ishii May 6 and May 11, 1918, Mr. Lansing stated that the American Government felt only a historical interest in the matter of currency reform in China and that it had no fundamental objection to the appointment of Baron Sakatani as currency adviser; also advised Mr. Lansing consented expressly that Ishii telegraph his Government to that effect.
I hesitate to believe that the Secretary of State should have yielded in an unmodified form and without quid pro quo one of the principal interests of America in China, in whose establishment and protection the Legation and leading Americans in China have been concerned for the last fifteen years and which has been guarded with great pains by the Legation under the instructions of October 13, 2 p.m., 1917,64 accomplishing this in a private conversation of which a record was apparently kept only by the party claiming the advantage. Therefore, I am anxiously awaiting your statement as to the real status of this matter before doing anything to modify the position taken or carefully to retrace the steps taken up to the present for the protection of this American interest. In the absence of information, position is most embarrassing.