793.94/5091
Memorandum by the Under Secretary of State (Castle) of a Conversation With the Japanese Ambassador (Debuchi)
The Ambassador said that he had not very much to report, but that he wanted to speak of the action of the Assembly of the League in connection with the Shanghai affair.
He said the negotiations with the Chinese were going on well enough in Shanghai under the guidance of the four powers; that his Government had accepted the proposal of Sir Miles Lampson,49 which he understood had been concurred in by Mr. Johnson, that Japanese withdrawal should take place as soon as conditions permitted, it was hoped within six months; instead of playing the game with the four neutrals the Chinese referred the matter to the Assembly of the League of Nations.50 The Ambassador said that he felt that the great [Page 216] powers had more or less sympathy with Japan, an assertion which I promptly denied, and a far greater understanding of the situation in Shanghai, but that the little powers on the League had run away with the whole matter. He said that article 11 of the agreement worked out by the committee of nineteen, that Japan should withdraw its troops when notified by the neutral commission in Shanghai that the time was right for withdrawal would be entirely unsatisfactory to his Government. He said that, in the first place, this notification did not apparently have to be unanimous and that his Government would not wish to be bound by any majority rule in a matter of this kind. He said, furthermore, that the withdrawal of Japanese troops could not be at the request of any commission, since under the Japanese Constitution troop movements were solely dictated by the Emperor. I told him that this was merely quibbling, since it stood to reason that the commission could not order the withdrawal of troops, but that it equally stood to reason that, if the Japanese Government agreed that the troops might be withdrawn when notification was given by the commission that they could be safely withdrawn, it was perfectly simple for the military authorities to ask the Emperor to bring about the withdrawal. It was perfectly obvious that the principal trouble in Japan was the feeling that in Geneva Japan was being dictated to by the small nations—he particularly mentioned Switzerland and Sweden, which countries he said knew little about the Chinese situation. I told him that, of course, these nations were acting for themselves in that they did not wish a precedent to be created whereby a strong power could, with impunity, invade other countries and then withdraw only when and how it pleased. The Ambassador said that if the small powers were able to put across their ideas Japan would undoubtedly not withdraw from the League of Nations, but would withdraw its delegates from the meetings of the Assembly, this, of course, as a protest. He admitted, however, that there was strong feeling in Japan that it would be better to get out of the League altogether.
As to the general situation in Japan, the Ambassador seemed to feel that it was slightly but very slowly improving. He admitted that the military was still in the saddle and that the course of the military was unpredictable. He spoke of the Russian concentration north of the Manchurian border and said there was no doubt that this concentration was being planned. On the other hand, he did not seem to feel that this constituted any serious danger as he said the Soviet had not made any definite protest to Japan within the last two months. He admitted, however, that the concentration was probably due to irritation at the Japanese advance into northern Manchuria.