793.94/3431
Memorandum by the Secretary of State
The French Ambassador called and read to me two messages received from his government. The first stated that they appreciate the force of our arguments; that M. Briand and the Secretary General of the League of Nations has [have] appointed General McCoy as a member of the Commission of the League of Nations in Manchuria and the Commission is now complete and will become official as soon as the Chinese and Japanese Governments give notice of their assent—the Chinese representative has already said that he has no objection. The second stated that the capture of Chinchow has entirely changed the situation in Manchuria, and the inquiry that Ambassador Claudel reported from his Foreign Office the other day of the questions to be made of the Japanese Government are no longer as important as they were then, because events have gone more quickly than anticipated; that under such conditions a new démarche seems entirely necessary to call once more the attention of the Tokyo Foreign Minister to the obligations which he has accepted and to bring him to accept clearly his responsibility; that it would be well to call attention to the absence of any resistance on the part of the Chinese troops; and how can the Japanese Government reconcile the large military movement with the terms of the Resolution of December 10th of the Council of the League [Page 5] of Nations,5 and reconcile it with the solemn obligations they took to refrain from any new initiative which would result in new loss of life and new battles; that the number of the Japanese forces in Manchuria seems now to be exceeding the number authorized for the protection of their railway, and such a fact inspires anxiety and would seem of itself alone to be reason for a new démarche, even if the capture of Chinchow was not sufficient to give a full reason for it; that M. Briand has authorized the French Ambassador in Japan to make such a démarche whenever his British and American colleagues have received similar authority and asks that the Government in Washington be informed and asked to instruct their Ambassador in Tokyo to make the same démarche, and that this in M. Briand’s opinion does not conflict with the note that we are proposing to send.
When the Ambassador had finished, I told him that I had been considering this matter since my last interview with him and I fully agreed that the occupation of Chinchow made it necessary for a new démarche by these countries; that, however, I felt that because the American Government was not a party to the League of Nations our démarche could not follow exactly the line pointed out in M. Briand’s telegram and be based upon the action of the Council of December 10th—that I felt we must follow the line of the treaties to which this government was a party and that I had been preparing a note to both China and Japan which would follow the basis in general of the Nine-Power Treaty6 and the Kellogg-Briand Pact.7 I then read him the third draft of the note upon which I had been working and told him that my final note would probably be along approximately that line and it would be sent in a very short time, probably through Tokyo. He said he fully understood my reason and agreed with it. He made the comment that the note seemed to him to be very strong.
- Foreign Relations, Japan, 1931–1941, vol. i, p. 59. This resolution was introduced on December 9, and is sometimes referred to by that date rather than December 10, the date of its approval by the Council.↩
- Signed at Washington, February 6, 1922, Foreign Relations, 1922, vol. i, p. 276.↩
- Signed at Paris, August 27, 1928, ibid., 1928, vol. i, p. 153.↩