793.94/4012
Memorandum by the Under Secretary of State (Castle)
The British Ambassador came in with a memorandum of the instructions sent the British Ambassador in Tokyo strongly to protest to the Japanese Government against the actions of the Japanese forces in the International Settlement in Shanghai interfering, as they have been doing, with the regular police assigned to the different sectors. He said that he very much hoped that the American Government would follow with a similar protest. (This is being done.)40
The Ambassador asked whether I had any comment to make on the Japanese answer which, he took for granted by the papers, had been sent. I told him it had not been sent and that the latest information we had was that Yoshizawa had gone into the country to discuss the matter with Prince Saionji. I showed him the copy of the Chinese answer. The Ambassador said that it was the feeling of his Government that the Japanese would accept the first four points, but not the fifth and that Mr. Stimson had, by telephone, made it clear that we considered the fifth point the most important of all of them. He asked me whether this was still our point of view. I told him the Japanese Ambassador had yesterday asked me the same thing, that I had answered that it certainly was the heart of the proposition in that it was the part of the plan which might bring about a real settlement.41 I told him the Japanese Ambassador had said to me that his Government would probably find great difficulty in assenting to the fifth point and that I had answered that whatever happened I hoped they would not turn down the fifth point. I said that if they would accept instantly and completely the first four points, leaving the fifth for discussion, a great step would have been made. I said that I had also impressed on [Page 197] him that we had no intention of dropping the fifth point out of the scheme because it really was the heart of the scheme.
The Ambassador said that he felt it to be very important that in all this matter we should go along step by step with the British. I said I entirely agreed with this, but asked why he laid stress on it. He said the reason was that there was, of course, a very strong party in England, the extreme Tories principally, who regretted the abandonment of the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, were determined not to get into any trouble with Japan and did not very much like the United States. He said the whole matter was psychological rather than political and that it was not based on common sense. I told him that this attitude of a certain section of the British public was probably the reason why there was an apparent fear in Congress particularly that we might go along with the British for a certain distance and that they would then leave us holding the bag. The Ambassador said that he knew this feeling existed and that this was another reason why he felt it important, that demonstrably the different moves should be parallel so that American opinion might not get the idea that the British would leave us in the lurch. He asked what move the British could take which would dissipate this feeling. I told him that I could hardly advise as to that although I thought the cordial working together so far was having an excellent effect. I said that I had heard a Senator say the other day that if a substantial part of the British fleet should go to Singapore that would certainly demonstrate the solidarity between the two countries because our own fleet was to be in Hawaiian waters for maneuvers. The Ambassador said that such a move would certainly be the strongest move that could possibly be made.
He said that he was rather optimistic as to the Japanese reply, at least in so far as the first four points were considered. I told him that I hoped he was right and that if there was a satisfactory reply, it obviously must be without reservation because the extremely important matter now was to prevent the sending of an expeditionary force.
- See telegram No. 37, February 3, 5 p.m., to the Ambassador in Japan, Foreign Relations, Japan, 1931–1941, vol. i, p. 179.↩
- See memorandum by the Under Secretary of State, February 2, Foreign Relations, Japan, 1931–1941, vol. i, p. 176.↩