894.00/882: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in France (Bullitt)
1563. Your 3021, December 21, 7 p.m. It should be recalled that during recent years every Japanese cabinet has been subject to various and varying conflicting pressures resulting from developments of a particular moment as they affect Japan’s position both internally and externally. We realize that there is a possibility but we see no reason for considering it a probability that the Abe government may soon be forced out. If it falls, what would come thereafter would presumably depend on what had preceded its fall. We are not greatly perturbed over the thought that there might follow a stronger demand for or even a consummation of a rapprochement between Japan and the Soviet Union.
With regard to the Japanese announcement of intention partially to open the Yangtze, subject apparently to many conditions, it is obvious that this action is associated in the minds of the Japanese with the Grew-Nomura conversations. The announcement of this intention is not new. The featuring of this intention at this time and the way in which it has been handled in the Japanese press suggests that the strategy is one of bargaining and in regard not only to economic but to political relationships. We have received indications that the Japanese Government is devoting attention to several other matters, such as the Shanghai extra-Settlement roads question. It seems evident that the Japanese Government is at present showing a somewhat conciliatory attitude toward the United States and that its attitude toward France and Great Britain is less actively antagonistic than at certain periods in the comparatively recent past. In the Grew-Nomura conversations, our Ambassador is stressing fundamentals, is not laying down conditions, and is not bargaining. We are concerned especially with principles and practices of fair treatment on the basis of equality, without preferences and without discriminations.
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