Office of the Historian

693.94244/26: Telegram

The Counselor of Embassy in China (Peck) to the Secretary of State

Nanking, May 22, 1936—11 a.m.
[Received May 22—9:30 a.m.]

150. Department’s 117, May 14, 5 p.m. to Peiping.

1.
I communicated the Department’s message to the Minister for Foreign Affairs during private conversation after a dinner given May 21, 8 p.m., by the Soviet Ambassador. The Minister for Foreign Affairs told me that the smuggling situation is still very serious and that the Chinese Government is now attempting to suppress smuggling through three measures: (1) inflicting severe penalties, (2) control of transportation through permits and (3) control through cooperation with Chamber of Commerce and similar organizations.
2.
At this point the Soviet Ambassador joined us and the conversation turned on Japanese activities. The Ambassador expressed the view to the Minister for Foreign Affairs that “Japan is saber rattling”. He said that his Government had discovered that the Japanese misunderstood conciliation as weakness and that boldness was probably the best preventive of war. (Compare my May 21, 9 a.m., paragraph 1, points 2 and 3). Referring to Manchurian border incidents, he said that his Government had denied to the Japanese Government the contention of the latter that boundaries were vague and had said that if any military parties crossed them into Soviet territory military action would result; that the Soviet Union would be glad if Japan did not regard such border incidents as casus belli but if Japan made them pretext for war then the Soviet Government “could not help it”. [Page 166] (These remarks seemed to be in part a repetition also of those reported in telegram number 97, April 3, from the American Ambassador at Moscow to the Department.)
3.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs was noncommittal but indicated general concurrence in the Ambassador’s description of Japan’s attitude and the correctness of the Soviet attitude toward Japan. He said to me that he thought the best way to settle difficulties in the Far East would be to convene a conference of the interested powers including China, the Soviet Union and the United States but he supposed the American Government would not be willing to exclude Japan. I observed that the Washington Conference on Far Eastern Affairs had included nine nations. The Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Ambassador asked me to express my personal opinion concerning the advisability of a conference but I evaded this. The conversation then terminated and the observation of the Minister for Foreign Affairs concerning a conference seemed to have been merely a chance remark and not premeditated.
4.
To Department and Peiping.
Peck