793.94/9102: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in China (Johnson)
129. Your 346, July 31, 11 a.m., and Department’s 123, July 31, 3 p.m.52 So far as the Department’s records indicate, the Japanese [Page 332] Ambassador here has made no express reference to south China. His statements in regard to Japanese intentions in north China have been confined to protestations of a general character such as, for instance, that Japan did not desire war and could be expected to come out of China in due course; that it was the purpose of the Japanese to localize the controversy and avoid general hostilities, et cetera.
In a written statement, apparently from his Foreign Office, which the Japanese Ambassador handed to the Secretary of State on July 12,53 there appears this: “In the circumstances, the Japanese Government has decided to take precautionary steps to meet all situations, including the dispatch of additional military forces to north China”; and, in a concluding paragraph, “In any case the Japanese Government is prepared to give full consideration to the rights and interests of the powers in China.”
In a conversation on July 16 with an officer of the Department, the Counselor of the Japanese Embassy here gave the impression, by the vagueness of his remarks in reply to questions in regard to Japanese objectives, that Japan wished to establish Japanese influence (in north China) more completely.
- Latter not printed.↩
- Foreign Relations, Japan, 1931–1941, vol. i, p. 318.↩