500.A15A4 General Committee/424: Telegram
The Chairman of the American Delegation (Davis) to the Secretary of State
[Received May 30—11 p.m.]
678. In a conversation with Sato45 today he told me he had a disagreeable task to perform namely to inform the General Commission that Japan would be unwilling to agree to the abolition of bombing without the concurrent abolition of aircraft carriers and furthermore that they could not accept the pact of nonaggression until the situation in the Far East is liquidated. I told him I did not know upon what conditions my Government would consider abolishing aircraft carriers since they are important for other uses than that of carrying bombers; that we are in favor of the unconditional abolition of the act of bombing; and that while our ultimate objective is the total abolition of military aviation I was satisfied we would not consider abolition of aircraft carriers without the abolition of submarines. To this he replied that while he could not definitely commit himself now he was inclined to believe Japan would agree to abolish submarines conditional upon the abolition of aircraft carriers. In view of the fact that he will probably state their position as indicated very soon I would appreciate instructions.
My judgment is that if Sato makes his acceptance of the abolition of bombing conditional on the abolition of aircraft carriers it would be desirable for me to take a position substantially as follows:
That the injection of this question in such a manner would prejudice the entire procedure to which we are committed inasmuch as it would open an endless debate on the naval chapter; that bombing is universally regarded as primarily a problem of land warfare and only incidentally a naval problem and that therefore to make bombardment from the air contingent on the abolition of a particular type of naval vessel would becloud the real issue; that bombing is an immense question [Page 179] by itself which for reasons of public opinion goes far beyond the mere technical side of its employment. Therefore we should not risk failure by making the abolition of bombing contingent on special or relatively minor consideration; furthermore that in our opinion the abolition of aircraft carriers is more logically and intimately connected with the abolition of submarines; but the question of submarines as well as all other naval questions of principle are to be dealt with by the naval powers at or prior to the conference in 1935 at which time we would welcome negotiations looking to the abolition of aircraft carriers together with submarines. As Sato has himself pointed out the Disarmament Convention can hardly enter into effect much before the conference of 1935 so that the relations of naval armament are but slightly involved.
- Member of the Japanese delegation to the General Commission; Ambassador to France.↩