893.512/1506: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Consul General at Shanghai (Gauss)
46. Your 52, January 11, 10 a.m. The Department desires that you bring emphatically to the attention of the Japanese authorities (a) our interest in the consolidated taxes, pointing out that these taxes are security for the cotton, wheat and flour credits of 1931 and 1933, which now form a consolidated obligation of the Chinese Government held by the Export-Import Bank of Washington; and (b) our insistence that the Japanese authorities take no action or countenance, in areas from which the legitimate Chinese authorities have withdrawn, action by any provisional regime which fails adequately to take into account the aforementioned obligation of the Chinese Government to the Export–Import Bank. You may add that we reserve the right to hold the Japanese authorities accountable for action disregardful of our interests in this matter.
For your information but not for communication to the Japanese, the obligation now amounts to $13,700,000, the Chinese Government having paid the installment due December 31, 1937.
Your 52 and the foregoing instruction have been repeated to Tokyo with authorization for the Ambassador to make an approach to the Japanese Government in the matter.