893.51/2892: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Chargé in Japan (Bell)65
282. This Government believes that the four interested powers should now issue simultaneously an announcement of the organization of the consortium with the approval of said Powers and it proposes that such an announcement be worded as follows:
“The agreement tentatively adopted in May, 1919, at Paris, by the representatives of the American, British, French and Japanese Banking Groups, covering the formation of the new consortium for the assistance of China, has now received the formal approval of all four of the Governments involved and the organization of the consortium is therefore an established fact, its first meeting being scheduled to be held at New York next October.
The international banking group thus coming into existence under the name of the consortium has been organized, not only with the approval, but at the instance of the four Governments involved, who have been a unit in believing that, through such organization, means could best be devised for assisting China in the stabilization of her economic situation and in the up-building of her great, basic public enterprises; further, that through such cooperative action, a greater degree of understanding and harmony with reference to Far Eastern matters might be reached among all five of the nations involved.”
You will lay the text above quoted before the Government to which you are accredited with the proposal that the four Powers concert in making simultaneous announcement in the near future, say on August 1st. You will also convey to the Government to which you are accredited this Government’s belief that this announcement should be communicated as a notification to the Chinese Government through their respective Legations at Peking.
- The same telegram to the Ambassador in Great Britain as no. 773, with instructions to repeat to the Ambassador in France as no. 1291.↩