793.94/9068
Memorandum by the Chief of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs (Hornbeck)
At the end of a conference held last evening, at which there had been present the Secretary, Mr. Hornbeck, and Mr. Hamilton, Mr. Hornbeck took to the British Ambassador, at the British Embassy, a penciled statement of which a copy is here attached.46
Mr. Hornbeck said that he was instructed to express regret that owing to the late hour at which the British Embassy’s memorandum had been received it had been found impossible to give at the moment this Government’s reply to the inquiry made in the memorandum but that we wanted to have the Ambassador and his Government informed of a step which the Secretary of State expected to take as indicated in the penciled statement.
The Ambassador asked whether I had been informed of the conversations which had been held between Mr. Eden and Mr. Bingham. I said that we had received a report on that conversation.47 The Ambassador handed me a sheaf of papers on which I found what obviously was the text, in pencil, of a telegram in which the British Foreign Office had informed the Ambassador of that conversation. This text had on it office instructions indicating that it had been sent from London to several British missions. The text gave a much [Page 228] longer and detailed account of the conversation under reference than that which had been given us by Mr. Bingham. In it, Mr. Eden was reported as having expressed himself as by no means dissatisfied with the efforts at “collaboration” in which the two Governments had engaged but as feeling that what we here speak of as a “united front” would be more effective than “parallel action.” He said that he had found that Mr. Bingham had no specific suggestion to make for further action. (Note: It will be remembered that Mr. Bingham had reported the same in regard to Mr. Eden.)
When I had finished reading the telegram, the Ambassador said that it was his impression that his Government did not feel insistent that there should be taken the form of action which it suggested in the memorandum which he had brought us, but that they wanted to leave no possible line of action unexplored and they felt that they had gone further than we had gone toward ensuring that their views were understood at Tokyo and at Nanking and they felt that clear indication to the Japanese and the Chinese Governments that the British and the American Governments view the matter with the same kind and the same degree of concern would be helpful.
I said that I had given the Ambassador all that I was authorized to give for the moment and that what I had given him should be regarded simply as information and not as a reply, which would be given in due course, to the memorandum under reference.