893.51/2725: Telegram
The Chargé in Great Britain ( Wright ) to the Acting Secretary of State
[Received 4:11 p.m.]
485. My 484 of March 20, noon. I have just received the copy of the memorandum [from] the Foreign Office to the Japanese Ambassador [Page 518] regarding Chinese loan consortium dated last night and which reads as follows:
“His Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs having carefully studied the memorandum and formula communicated by His Excellency the Japanese Ambassador on March 16th, relative to the position of South Manchuria and East Inner Mongolia under the proposed consortium has the honor to make the following observation.
In the memorandum handed to Viscount Chinda on November 20, last,89 Lord Curzon clearly enunciated the objections felt by His Majesty’s Government to the Japanese claim to exclude from the sphere of the consortium a large geographical area of China and he is now regretfully forced to the conclusion that little or no modification of this original attitude is to be found in the wording of the formula suggested. The phrase which runs ‘in matters relative to loans affecting South Manchuria and East Inner Mongolia which in their opinion are calculated to create a serious impediment to the security of the economic life and national defense of Japan, the Japanese Government reserve the right to take the necessary steps and guarantee such security’ is so ambiguous and general in character that it might be held to indicate on the part of the Japanese Government a continued desire to exclude the cooperation of the other three banking groups from participating in the development for China’s benefit of important parts of the Chinese Republic and therefore creates the impression that the Japanese reservations cannot be reconciled with [the principle] of the independence and the realization of the integrity of China.
While His Majesty’s Government clearly recognize the legitimate desire of the Japanese Nation to be assured of the supplies of food and raw material necessary to her economic life and her justifiable wish strategically to protect and maintain the Korean frontier, they find it impossible to believe that in order to meet such needs it is essential for Japan alone to construct and control for instance the three railway lines mentioned in the third reservation lying to the west of the South Manchurian Railway.
In order however to meet as far as possible the wishes of the Japanese Government and at the same time to avoid the mention of specific areas which rightly or wrongly might give rise to the impression that a special sphere of interest was being officially recognized, His Majesty’s Government would be prepared to subscribe to a written assurance to the effect that the Japanese Government need have no reason to apprehend that the consortium would direct any activities affecting the security of the economic life and national defense of Japan and they can firmly rely on the faith of the powers concerned to refuse to countenance any operations inimical to such interests.”
Paris informed.
- See telegram no. 3447, Nov. 25, 1919, from the Ambassador in Great Britain, Foreign Relations, 1919, vol. i, p. 502.↩