Office of the Historian

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Memorandum of Conversation, by the Acting Secretary of State

[Washington,] March 22, 1941.

The Soviet Ambassador called to see me this morning at his request. I said to the Ambassador, as I had in previous conversations, that I felt it of the utmost importance for the two countries to remain in close touch with regard to developments in the Far Eastern situation. The Ambassador asked me if I had anything of importance with regard to developments within Japan in the past few weeks and I said that I had no information of any particular value but that I had gained the impression that the forces in Japan which were opposed to a policy of rigid military expansion, either north or south, were increasing in strength. The Ambassador said that he had this same impression. I said that I had been gratified to learn that the Chinese Government was now receiving valuable military supplies from the Soviet Union and the Ambassador replied that he knew this was the fact and that he believed such assistance would increase in scope during the next few weeks.

Mr. Oumansky stated that he was entirely uninformed as to what, if anything, would be said to Mr. Matsuoka when he visited Moscow. [Page 113] He indicated vaguely and indefinitely that his Government was more apprehensive than it had been with regard to German designs upon the Soviet Union,59 but, as he always does, insisted that Russia had nothing to fear because of her own completely satisfactory national defense situation. I obtained the definite impression that the Ambassador in reality has not been kept informed by his Government, at least recently, of any questions of importance relative either to German-Soviet relations, to Russian policy in the Near East nor to the apprehensions which the Soviet Government may have regarding German-Japanese designs against the Soviet Union.

S[umner] W[elles]
  1. For Mr. Welles’ warning of German attack on the Soviet Union, see memorandum dated March 20, Department of State, Peace and War: United States Foreign Policy, 1981–1941 (Washington, Government Printing Office, 1943), p. 638.↩