711.94/2280
Memorandum by the Secretary of State of a Conversation With the British Chargé (Campbell)
Minister Campbell called at his request. He inquired about the Japanese situation. I told him that all of the recent publicity about an agreement this week or at any particular time in the future was propaganda. I said that, speaking in great confidence, the Government officials in Japan were putting out reports to such an effect, presumably on the theory that it may enlist support of public opinion and check the efforts of the extreme elements in Japan to carry public opinion in the opposite direction. The Minister thought the greatest difficulty about the Chinese-Japanese matter would be Manchuria, so far as a settlement might be concerned. I indicated to him that the Japanese Government might be disposed to settle with China in other ways provided that the Japanese acted in good faith and could so satisfy the Chinese. I made it clear to the Minister that negotiations were still in an exploratory stage and that a number of basic matters would have to be discussed and settled before we would be in a position to take up the matter in earnest with the Chinese, the British and other interested countries; that I doubted if that situation ever would develop and that, in my opinion, delaying the possible expansion movements of Japan,97 which I have had in mind since last spring, was still a matter of primary consideration.
- Penciled notation by the Chief of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs (Hamilton) on his copy of this memorandum: “At the Secretary’s suggestion, I stressed to Sir Ronald Campbell today the need to safeguard against publicity. Sept. 16, 1941.” (FE Files, Lot 244.)↩