793.94/4131: Telegram
The Consul General at Nanking (Peck) to the Secretary of State
[Received 4:03 p.m.]
45. 1. On February 9, 4 p.m., the Japanese Consul General, who is still living on a commercial steamer in the harbor, called and told me that important persons in the Chinese Government had made informal approaches to him to discover whether the possibility existed that an agreement might be come to which would stop the fighting at Shanghai; he thought that the Chinese Foreign Office was probably ignorant of these tentative investigations. He refused to state who his correspondents had been but he expressed the opinion that the 19th Route Army which is now fighting the Japanese at Shanghai is not under effective control by the Nanking Government. The Japanese Consul referred several times to the difficulties caused by factional differences among the Chinese and was clearly under the impression that an influential section of the Chinese Government would be glad to come to terms with the Japanese at Shanghai if it were not prevented by Cantonese troops at Shanghai who insist on fighting to the bitter end.
2. Later on the same day I received a call from a Chinese who is not an officer of the Government but is in close touch with politics and has hitherto been generally reliable. This informant stated that the Chinese Government would gladly welcome mediation by foreign powers at Shanghai and would agree to any proposal practically feasible. He said that the Government is unable itself to initiate negotiations with the Japanese (firstly) because it would then have no course but to yield on all points and (secondly) because the Chinese public would universally condemn so obviously futile a procedure. In regard to the rumored indifference of the Cantonese troops at Shanghai to the authority of the Nanking Government, the informant said that it is not quite probable that under normal conditions Sun Fo and Eugene Chen might be able to utilize these troops against the Chiang Kai-shek following in the Government but he insisted that Government is secretly supporting the troops in their struggle with the Japanese with re-enforcements and munitions. He stated that it was necessary to conceal this support from the Japanese because the latter might seize on it as a pretext for taking military measures at Nanking.
3. The Japanese Consul told me recently that he had protested to the Chinese Government against the passage of one contingent of troops from the north to the [south?] bank of Yangtze and had been satisfied by the explanation that it was merely a replacement of local guards. From these and other evidences it seems clear that the Chinese [Page 276] Government both because of its own conviction and of internal political necessity is publicly maintaining its announced policy of resistance to Japanese aggression at Shanghai while it is informally and secretly giving the Japanese the impression that it is not assisting the Chinese troops at Shanghai and is willing to enter into direct negotiations. Known political alignments assist the Chinese Government in creating this impression. Presence of many Japanese naval vessels at Nanking and elsewhere on the Yangtze show that the Japanese are ready to prevent assistance from reaching Shanghai and the Chinese Government apparently hopes by creating impression above described to forestall military action in Yangtze region. The American Minister concurs in these views.
Repeated to Tokyo and Peiping for information.