893.00/9289
The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs to the American Legation8
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs presents its compliments to the American Legation, and has the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the Legation’s memorandum (No. 452, of June 2, 1927) stating:
“… Reenforcements to the American forces maintained at Tientsin under the authorization of the Boxer Protocol, consisting of one regiment of Marines have been despatched to Tientsin.…
“These reenforcements have been despatched … solely for the purpose of protecting American lives and property and … in the event of civil warfare in North China … to provide against the repetition of any such incidents as recent events in South China.
“These … forces will be withdrawn as soon as it is demonstrated that their presence is no longer required.”
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has the honor to observe that, while the International Protocol of 1901 permits the signatory Powers to order up troops adequate to keep open communications between Peking and the sea, nevertheless, the number sufficient to maintain communications should be taken as the limit and these should not be unlimitedly reenforced. Furthermore, North China has recently been exceedingly tranquil and there has not been the slightest obstruction of open communications between the Metropolis and the sea. As to the lives and property of foreign residents, this Government has hitherto been exceedingly careful to accord protection, and it is certainly unnecessary to order up reenforcements. Moreover, conditions in North and South differ; how, then, can events in the South furnish an excuse for ordering up troops?
A few years ago at the Washington conference the plenipotentiary representatives of participating Powers, with the exception of China, passed a resolution respecting China’s sovereignty.9 This recent ordering of additional troops to North China by your Government is not in accordance with the spirit of the Washington conference resolution. For these reasons the Ministry of Foreign Affairs desires to file a protest, and therefore, has the honor to indite this memorandum [Page 131] for the information of the American Minister, requesting that he will be so good as to inform his Government of the contents without delay, that his Government may give its most earnest consideration and [to the] withdrawal of these reenforcements at an early date, in order that the present intimacy and harmony of the friendly relations between the two countries may not be adversely affected and in order to accord with the original intent of the International Protocol of 1901. This is the Ministry’s most earnest hope.
- Copy transmitted to the Department by the Minister in China as an enclosure in his despatch No. 1098, June 16; received Aug. 8.↩
- The reference is apparently to resolution VII, Foreign Relations, 1922, vol. i, p. 292.↩