793.94/4425
Memorandum by the Secretary of State
The French Ambassador came in to see me and he told me he was much troubled by the constant assertion that France had an understanding with Japan in respect to the present situation in the Far East. He called to my attention a speech which appeared in this morning’s papers by Senator Moses of New Hampshire making the same suggestion. He said he received constant letters on the subject and he was much troubled. He said he was proposing to make a statement on the subject and he showed me a draft and asked me whether I had any objection in the draft. The Ambassador mentioned that he had been furnishing me with cooperation and information. As I recall it, I told him that I had no objection to his making such statement if he wanted to but I suggested that it might appear to give undue seriousness to statements which were now mere gossip and rumor. I told him that I had told a great many people of his Government’s helpfulness in giving me the information which came from the seat of trouble as they received it through their ministers and ambassadors and that if anybody inquired at the press conference I would say the same thing.
The Ambassador then went into the situation in Shanghai and spoke of the danger of a Chinese attack upon the Settlement in case the Japanese withdrew. I replied that I thought our best offense against Chinese attack was to make it clear that we had no sympathy with aggression against China and, particularly, no sympathy with any attempt to break down the guarantees of the Open Door and the Nine Power Treaty. I told him that I had written a letter to Senator Borah,95 which was being published for that purpose, and I showed him the press release of this letter. The Ambassador read it through carefully and congratulated me on the statement. When he reached the paragraph in which I pointed out that the Nine Power Treaty was interrelated with the other disarmament treaties and that it should not be modified without reference to the counter promises made for which it was the consideration, he was evidently much impressed and [Page 429] said that was very strong; again when he read the paragraph about the Kellogg-Briand Pact and the assertion that the protection of the Chinese people was a necessary part of the program for the welfare of the world, he again said he thought that was very strong. I told the Ambassador that I reported to the President what he had said to me about the meeting of the Assembly of the League of Nations next week and I pointed out to him that it was necessary for the Assembly to first make a decision as to the rights and wrongs of the controversy before it before they came to the question of remedy or punishment, and that it was premature to come to us to ask what we would do in the way of punishment before they had decided that there was any case for punishment. The Ambassador said, “Well, if they go ahead and decide that, will you then do something?” I said, “We will then discuss that with them in the light of their decision.”
- For text, see telegram No. 50, February 24, 1932, 2 p.m., to the Consul General at Shanghai, Foreign Relations, Japan, 1931–1941, vol. i, p. 83.↩