Foreign Relations of the United States Diplomatic Papers, 1932, The Far East, Volume IV

793.94/5512

Speech Delivered by Dr. Lo Wen-kan, Minister of Foreign Affairs at Nanking, at the Weekly Memorial Service of Dr. Sun Yat-sen on August 29, 1932³³

Nanking, August 29, 1932

Japan has at last thrown down the gauntlet against the conscience of the whole world. The long speech delivered before the Japanese Diet on August 29th [25th] by Count Uchida, the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs, laid bare Japan’s intentions completely that she does not need to seek any pretext in the future in the prosecution of her scheme of aggression in China. Ignoring the entreaties for peace from all humanity, defying the League of Nations and other peace machinery, and disregarding her obligations assumed under solemn international treaties, Japan has told the world in effect that she has the right to invade the territory of China, to seize the Three Eastern Provinces, to set up a puppet government and call it an independent state, and finally to shape and control its destiny until Japan and her puppet become one political entity in name as well as in fact. Count Uchida’s thesis is indeed a tale of medieyal militarism guised in twentieth century language.

Japan has pleaded self-defence for all her acts of aggression and she now argues that the exercise of the right of self-defence may extend beyond the territory of the power exercising that right and that the Kellogg-Briand Anti-War Pact does not prohibit a Signatory Power from availing itself of that right at its own discretion. Such pernicious argument reveals the attempt on the part of Japan to destroy the validity of the Anti-War Pact altogether. If it could be accepted by the other sixty-one Signatory Powers as a correct interpretation of that epoch-making Treaty, then the whole document would be a sham and nations which have renounced war as an instrument of national policy would seem to have reserved the right to fight an aggressive war in the territory of a neighboring Power.

In fact the Signatory Powers to that famous Treaty, including Japan, mutually agreed that the settlement or solution of all disputes or conflicts of whatever nature or whatever origin they might be which might arise among them shall never be sought except by pacific means. If Japan had really suffered injuries with respect to her important rights and interests in China, as she now seems to contend, she could have resorted to any pacific means known in international law to seek due redress from the Chinese Government. Without even bringing any cause of complaint to the knowledge of the Chinese National Government, Japan, on the night of September 18th, 1931, caused her troops to open sudden and unprovoked attack on the Chinese garrison at Shenyang (Mukden) and seized that city by force, and then deliberately and progressively extended her military operations until the whole of Manchuria is now under her occupation and control. To plead self-defence under such circumstances only aggravates the wrong of the pleading party. In the recently uttered words of Colonel Stimson, the Secretary of State of the United States of America, “a nation which sought to mask imperialistic policy under the guise of defence of its nationals would soon be unmasked”, and Japan has already unmasked herself.

It is a highly preposterous assertion that the puppet organization created and supported by Japan herself has achieved independence through the spontaneous will of the Manchurians and that the Nine Power Treaty does not forbid any separatist movement in China nor recognition by Japan of any new State formed as a result of such a movement.

The whole world knows that in the Three Eastern Provinces there never has been any separatist movement from within, but there has been an aggressive and imperialistic movement from without. It is the Japanese militarists who have brought all the theatrical paraphernalia to Manchuria and set up on the stage a bogus government styled by the epithet of the Independent State of Manchukuo. It is the Japanese militarists who have translated their own free will into action. It is the Japanese militarists who are browbeating, intimidating, and oppressing the thirty million citizens of the Republic of China, who are prevented by sheer force from asserting their own spontaneous will. Geographically, historically, and psychologically, the Three Eastern Provinces will remain a part of Chinese territory and the inhabitants of these Provinces will remain loyal citizens of the Chinese Republic. With the Japanese troops once withdrawn the bogus organization will at once collapse like a pack of cards.

If there were in China a separatist movement in the true sense of the term, the Nine Power Treaty might not be brought into play, as that Treaty is not designed to regulate questions in China of a purely domestic nature. But when a part of Chinese territory has been forcibly seized and occupied by Japan, who maintains therein an organization of its own creation, there is not the slightest doubt that such actions constitute a flagrant violation of those provisions of the Nine Power Treaty, whereby the Signatory Powers, including Japan, engage to respect the territorial and administrative integrity of China. Japan’s guilt in violating this Treaty commenced with the opening of her attack on the night of September 18th, 1931, and has been continuously aggravated with each of her subsequent acts, including the kidnapping of Pu Yi, and the placing of him at the head of the puppet organization. Her guilt will assume still greater proportions but will not be of a different nature when she carries out her declared intention to accord recognition to the unlawful regime she herself has created.

Count Uchida knew himself he was making an assertion which was diametrically opposite to the truth when he declared Manchuria had entered upon a career of sturdy and healthy progress. There are unmistakable evidences of the people’s opposition to the Japanese domination gathering momentum every day and everywhere in the Three Eastern Provinces. In face of the Japanese bombing and gunfiring volunteer forces keep on their activities with redoubled energy. As for commerce and industry in Manchuria, they have been steadily on the decline since the Japanese occupation and in fact never have economic conditions in that region been worse than they are at present. There will be no peace and prosperity in the Three Eastern Provinces until all Japanese troops have been withdrawn from places where they have no right to appear and until the Chinese Government regains control over the land now temporarily lost to us.

The Japanese Foreign Minister, in attempting to justify Japan’s aggression in China, referred to our domestic administration and activities of the communists. We do not pretend to possess a perfect administration, an administration free from those political vicissitudes common to all countries. Nor do we claim complete successes in our work of suppressing communism hitherto undertaken. We also admit we have not been exempt from the effects of the universal economic depression. We were harassed last year by unprecedented floods and are still suffering from their damaging consequences. Under such circumstances we had believed the Japanese people, like the people of every other nation, would have shown us the greatest sympathy and given us at least moral help in our stupendous task of rehabilitation. That Japan should take advantage of China’s internal difficulties and launch a premeditated scheme of military aggression yet unheard of in the annals of the modern world was indeed beyond human conjecture.

Japan has now defied the whole world—the League of Nations, the Anti-War Pact, the Nine Power Treaty and other international commitments, and finally the public opinion of mankind. She is laboring under the fanciful idea that she could realize her dream of military conquest by rushing matters through and creating a fait accompli before the world pronounces its final judgment. But the enlightened nations of the world have already declared they will not recognize any situation brought about by violence.

I want to take this opportunity to emphasize a few important points of policy of the Chinese Government in respect to the present situation.

1. Neither the Chinese Government nor the Chinese people entertain the least anti-foreign feelings. However, in view of the present state of affairs produced by Japan’s military aggression, it would be absolutely impossible for the Chinese people to express the most cordial friendly sentiments to the Japanese people. It entirely rests with Japan herself to improve and restore relations between the Chinese and Japanese people.

2. China will never surrender one inch of her territory nor any of her sovereign rights under stress of military force which she condemns and is determined to resist to the best of her ability.

3. China will never agree to any solution of the present situation which takes into account the puppet organization in the Three Eastern Provinces established, maintained and controlled by the Japanese military forces.

4. China is confident that any reasonable proposal for the settlement of the present situation will be necessarily compatible with the letter and spirit of the Covenant of the League of Nations, the Anti-War Pact, and the Nine Power Treaty, as well as with China’s sovereign power, and will also effectively secure everlasting peace in the Far East.

33. Copy transmitted to the Chief of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs by the First Secretary of the Chinese Legation under covering letter of August 30, 1932.