Office of the Historian

793.94/14031: Telegram

The Consul General at Hankow (Josselyn) to the Secretary of State

Hankow, October 9, 1938—noon.
[Received 8:20 p.m.]

My September 28, 10 a.m. and October 3, 11 a.m.31

1.
Conversation with Chou En-lai and a press statement by him indicate that the Chinese Communist Party as a result of the Yenan conference of September 28 to October 7 has recommitted itself to the united front.
2.
At the time of the departure of the political leaders mentioned in the Consulate General’s telegram of September 28, 10 a.m. there was evident resentment on the part of the Communists against the Government because of the latter’s effective opposition to the Communist propaganda and mass mobilization program for Chinese held territory, especially the Wuhan area.
3.
After his return here on October 1 Chou En-lai once more pledged the Chinese Communist Party to cooperation with the Kuomintang during and after the present hostilities, allegiance to the leadership of Chiang Kai Shek, recognition of the Three People’s Principles as the political base of the united front and asked for obliteration of the memory of 10 years of civil strife. The Chinese Communist Party intends to continue, however, its independent existence. It calls for the establishment in each province and hsien a people’s political council that democratic principles may thereby be put into effect.
4.
Chou En-lai is now conferring with Kuomintang leaders in an effort to strengthen the united front.
5.
The zeal of the Chinese Communist Party for the United Front is real for it is by means of the United Front that the Reds hope to hold defeatist elements in the National Party to prolonged resistance against Japan. To insure continuance of the United Front it has quieted its vociferous agitation concerning the suppression of Communist China organizations and thorough mobilization of the people.
6.
The Central Government so far as can be ascertained has made no concession to the Communists in Chinese held territory. So long as the ruling faction retains its present character it will hardly establish genuinely representative congresses for fear that the Communists, using democracy as a Trojan horse, will ride into power.
7.
Freedom of action in Chinese held territory is at present for the Chinese Communist Party a secondary and academic issue overshadowed by the military, political and economic situation confronting it in a steadily expanding area of actual and potential Communist control behind the advancing Japanese lines.
8.
Finally it is increasingly evident from its program of action for the present and any predictable future that the Chinese Communist Party is not justified in designating itself as a Communist organization. Its action for the present and any predictable future envisages little more in the way of social revolution than land reform, cooperatives, lower rents and interest and in official life plain honesty.

Repeated to Chungking, Peiping, Shanghai.

Josselyn
  1. Latter not printed.↩