393.11/1099: Telegram
The Minister in China (Johnson) to the Secretary of State
259. Legation’s 190, March 12, 11 a.m., and 239, March 31, 4 p.m.
1. The following comments are taken from a report dated April 7th entitled “Banditry and Communist Disorders” by Major Magruder of the office of the Military Attaché:
“…87 Generally disorderly conditions are now so prevalent that special attention should be called to a condition which is a present menace to foreign lives in the interior and which may become a fertile field for Communist agitation on a dangerous scale. Due to the opposition of the Northern coalition to the Government, the most dependable troops have been withdrawn from their normal garrison areas into the concentration effected for the immediate defense of the capital. Even before this emergency, the Government was unable to maintain order over large areas under its nominal control.
So long as the present Government exerts authority in a given area it may be expected that organized communism can reassert itself only with the greatest difficulty. Wherever the Government authority has lapsed south of the Yangtze River the communist seeds, planted under the aegis of the Kuomintang itself, have sprouted vigorously. The danger then is that governmental authority which undeniably has shrunk in the past year may continue to diminish or that it may actually crumble under the ceaseless attacks of the opposition.”
2. In view of the potential dangers in the situation thus described which appear to me definitely to threaten the security of American residents throughout large areas in Central and Southern China, I respectfully suggest that the Department, in addition to informing the Catholic authorities whose missionaries are stationed in Kiangsi, make the existing conditions generally known to the interested mission boards with a view to having American citizens in the affected areas withdrawn from exposed points until more suitable conditions are restored. At a time when the Central Government is fighting for its existence and must of necessity concentrate its forces, the Legation believes it unreasonable to make demands upon the Government that troops be maintained to protect scattered groups of Americans resident at remote points in the interior of the country.