893.00/13604: Telegram
The Counselor of Embassy in China ( Peck ) to the Secretary of State
[Received July 12—6:55 a.m.]
222. 1. The second plenary session Fifth Central Executive and Supervisory Committees held an opening and preparatory session yesterday morning. The first regular session is scheduled for this morning. Among the officials now here or en route to Nanking for the session are: Yu Han Mou, Commander of Chen Chi Tang’s First Army; Chang Hsueh Liang; T. V. Soong; Shanghai Mayor Wu Teh Chen; Wang Chung Hui; the five Southwestern delegates named in Canton’s July 7, /1 p.m.62 who arrived yesterday; the Provincial Chairmen of Chekiang, Fukien, Anhwei, Kiangsi, Hunan, Hupei, Honan and 190 out of 255 regular and reserve members are expected to be in attendance. Tang Shao Yi63 is also here, reportedly having left Canton to escape being unwillingly involved in the Southwestern revolt.
2. Yu Han Mou arrived by plane July 8 and is reported by Central News Agency as having informed press correspondents that hereafter Kwangtung would “adhere to the policy of the Central Government in all matters affecting the state”. We are reliably informed that Yu’s alignment with Nanking was arranged by General Tang Sheng Chih, Inspector General of military training, who made a secret visit to Hong Kong where he accomplished his mission (which may have included the deferring of the Cantonese) by a financial [arrangement?] involving needed diversions of several millions of dollars.
3. The situation in the Southwest seems to be changing so rapidly that it is difficult to forecast what may develop in the session. Unless the Southwestern rebels capitulate it is considered likely that the session will formulate some mildly worded resolution concerning the necessity of maintaining discipline in order to give Chiang, if need therefor should arise, a mandate under which to subdue them. The Government is frankly worried about Han Fu Chu and the possibility that Chang would cause him to join with Sung in forming a “neutral” regime in North China including Shantung. Feng Yu Hsiang64 is [Page 241] understood to have whole-heartedly aligned himself with Han and it is reliably reported that Government agents discourage visits to Feng and intercept his correspondence. A Japanese inspired report that Chang Hsueh Liang and his commanders are thinking of setting up a Northwestern regime are discredited by reliable sources here and are believed to have arisen from a recent conference with Chiang Kai Shek and Feng Yo Hsiang during which Chang Hsueh Liang and Feng are reliably stated to have very strongly advised Chiang not to embark upon a punitive expedition against the Southwest because they considered that general public sentiment opposed such a course.
To the Department and Peiping; repeated to Canton, Hankow, by mail to Shanghai, Tsinanfu.