Office of the Historian

893.24/795a: Telegram

The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in Japcm (Grew)

Washington, July 17, 1940—7 p.m.

275. The following is an excerpt from tonight’s Radio Bulletin:

“At the press conference this morning, a correspondent referred to a news despatch from Berlin quoting authorized German sources as claiming that the Government of the United States should protest against the British blockade on the same grounds on which it has opposed the closing of the Burma Route to China—the grounds that the blockade involves the closing of trade routes. In reply, the Secretary said that where nations were at war and had the status of belligerents they had a right on the high seas under the limitations of the law relating to contraband to intercept commerce or prevent unneutral acts. He said that an entirely different rule prevailed in the case of a highway running through the interior of nations not at war. A correspondent asked whether, in other words, if Japan wanted the Burma Route closed it would be up to Japan to establish an active sea blockade. The Secretary answered in the affirmative. He added that, as he had said before, the high seas were supposed to belong to everyone, and yet in time of war a belligerent had the right to invoke belligerent rights and prevent contraband from reaching the opposing belligerent, with the result that neutrals even may lose their entire cargoes when they are destined for one belligerent and captured at sea by another. A correspondent asked whether this meant that since no formal state of war existed between Japan and China, Japan did not have the right to blockade the British. The Secretary answered that he had not heard that this right had been invoked by a country which was not at war.

A correspondent said that it had been officially announced today that the British had agreed to close the Burma Route, and he asked whether the Secretary could add anything to his statement of yesterday in this connection.92 The Secretary replied that he had nothing further in mind.”

Hull
  1. See press release issued by the Department of State, July 16, Foreign Relations, Japan, 1931–1941, vol. ii, p. 101.↩