693.119/351

The Chief of the Far Eastern Division, Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce, Department of Commerce (Eldridge) to the Assistant Chief of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs, Department of State (Lockhart)

My Dear Mr. Lockhart: We are enclosing herewith copy of a report on aeroplanes in China, recently received from our Acting Commercial Attaché, Peking, China, in which it is thought you might be interested.

Very truly yours,

F. R. Eldridge, Jr.
[Enclosure]

The Acting Commercial Attaché at Peking (Batchelder) to the Director of the Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce, Department of Commerce (MacElwee)

No. 57

Personal attention Mr. Eldridge.

Sir: Possibly you may be interested in the attached cards of one of my callers, Col. Teheng Hung, who stated that he was in charge of the “strictly commercial” aeroplanes which have been sold to the Chinese Government. He made no pretense of being interested in commerce, any more than the foreign instructors, or the young military aviators. You have probably seen the newspaper account that the Italian Legation admitted the sales of arms and members of the Legation saw the trench mortars marked “Italian Navy, Peking,” which were sold to Tuan Chi-jui. The recent fighting all over China shows that the arms embargo has been totally ineffective, as predicted in my earlier letters.

The commercial aspect of the matter is that American concerns are losing many profitable sales of munitions, as the U.S. Government [Page 748] seems to be the only one which attempts to prevent its nationals from securing munitions contracts. The arms embargo is a dead letter except as regards Americans. Merchants are constantly coming to me to protest, but I tell them all this is a State Department matter and refer them to the Legation. It is thought that you might like to know the real facts in case inquiries are made as to whether shipments are being made.

The representative of one American arms manufacturer told me personally that his concern was making monthly shipment of arms to Chinese Generals through two Japanese concerns whose names he gave me. He also gave this information to the Legation.

C. C. Batchelder