793.94 Commission/650: Telegram
The Ambassador in Japan (Grew) to the Secretary of State
[Received December 14—2:37 a.m.]
280. My 279, December 13, 5 p.m. In his talk with the Minister for Foreign Affairs on the 12th the British Ambassador further expressed the hope that the Japanese Government would agree to inviting the United States and Soviet Russia to be represented on the conciliation commission referred to. Yesterday afternoon Count Uchida told Lindley that while he was still awaiting certain information from Geneva he could give him an interim reply to the effect that the Japanese Government could probably not see its way clear to approving the issuance of these invitations to states not members of the League of Nations. This attitude he said was not based on any legal or theoretical aspect of the matter but upon the practical consideration that the United States and Soviet Russia not being members of the League could not share its obligations.
Lindley then told Count Uchida of a new proposal that had been made in Geneva in a conversation between Sir John Simon and Matsuoka that the dispute should be referred to a small conciliation commission of five members. Count Uchida inquired whether this proposal also envisaged inviting the United States and Soviet Russia to participate in this small commission. Lindley replied that this point had not been made clear in the telegrams which he had received from Geneva.