893.6363 Manchuria/231: Telegram
The Minister in China (Johnson) to the Secretary of State
[Received July 7—6:10 a.m.]
343. In despatches dated June 19 and July 19 [1] the Mukden Consul General reports that Katakura and Company, a large and reliable Japanese firm hitherto engaged chiefly in the silk trade has, allegedly after consultation with the Japanese Ministeries of War and Finance, proposed to the Standard-Vacuum Oil Company that it be given an exclusive agency in “Manchukuo” and the Kwantung Leased Territory for the sale of all of Standard’s products, including those monopolized, the management of Standard’s investments and the collection of its outstanding accounts. He reports that the firm offers to sell under Standard’s trademarks and to use Standard’s agency organization having it is alleged the privilege of selling directly to the Japanese Army in “Manchukuo”, the Japanese Government offices, the South Manchurian Railway, the “Manchukuo” State Railways, and the “Manchukuo” army; that it has apparently reached a definite understanding with the army authorities because it has expressed a willingness to guarantee the sale of some 10,000,000 gallons a year in competition with the monopoly, and to underwrite this guarantee with deposit of 1,000,000 yen. He says that the Standard representative has referred [Page 920] the proposal to his superiors. He reports also that the Texas Company appears to have abandoned its former policy of acting in concert with the other two foreign companies and that it has already sold its stocks in Manchuria to the monopoly at prices below those asked by the other firms.