893.102S/1799a: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Japan (Grew)49
125. Please call at the earliest opportunity upon the Minister for Foreign Affairs and inform him orally, as under instruction from [Page 47] your Government, that according to a press despatch from Shanghai a Japanese spokesman is reported to have made remarks today indicating that Japan might occupy the International Settlement at Shanghai, that it is of course possible that the statements of the Japanese spokesman at Shanghai may not have been accurately reported; that your Government is unable to believe that the views attributed to the spokesman represent the official views of the Japanese Government; that it is the view of your Government that adjustment of any problems which have arisen in connection with the International Settlement at Shanghai can and should be effected by orderly discussion by and among the parties concerned; and that your Government would regard as unlawful and unwarranted and as a deliberate impairment of rights and interests of the United States any usurpation by any power of the rights and duties of the duly constituted authorities of the International Settlement at Shanghai.
Please also inform the Foreign Minister that your Government is giving full consideration to the Japanese Government’s recent communication50 in regard to matters affecting the International Settlement at Shanghai and that it expects shortly to have completed a reply thereto.
Please repeat to Shanghai for repetition by Shanghai to Peiping and Chungking.
- Approved by President Roosevelt.↩
- Aide-mémoire of May 3, Foreign Relations, Japan, 1931–1941, vol. i, p. 838.↩