793.94/13226: Telegram
The First Secretary of Embassy in China (Salisbury) to the Secretary of State
[Received June 15—12:15 p.m.]
365. The Japanese spokesman admits that the Yellow River flood which he states has now reached the Lunghai Railway has completely checked the Japanese advance on Chengchow, Honan. He informed me that the spreading water would probably make necessary the abandonment by forces in the Kaifeng–Chengchow area of a southward push toward Hankow down the Pinghan Railway. This would seem to indicate that attacks on that railway south of Chengchow will come from the east and that the direction of the main Japanese attack upon Hankow will be from the east (including attack up the Yangtze and along the north shore of that river).
Repeated to Hankow, Nanking, Shanghai. By mail to Tokyo.