793.94/7408: Telegram
The Counselor of Embassy in China (Lockhart) to the Secretary of State
[Received November 20—10:42 a.m.]
163. Embassy’s 162, November 20, 2 p.m.45 Hsiao Chen-ying has informed local press correspondent that he received a peremptory order from Chiang Kai-shek last night to discontinue negotiations with Japanese. Hsiao and another Chinese official stated that negotiations have now been transferred to Nanking with Ariyoshi participating and that formation of a new regime in North China is postponed.
2. According to the interpretation of one local Chinese official, Chiang Kai-shek’s speech of November 19 on foreign relations before the Kuomintang (presumably reported by Nanking) did not foreshadow surrender to Japanese demands but was a public notice of China’s pacific intentions indicating that the National Government is prepared to discuss with Japan Sino-Japanese problems but that China will offer resistance and Japan will incur responsibility for overt aggression if Japan should attempt to force China to accept demands infringing territorial sovereignty or national authority.
Repeated to Nanking and Shanghai, by mail to Tokyo.
- Not printed.↩