893.00/15056
The Chargé in China (Atcheson) to the Secretary of State
[Received July 16.]
Sir: There is enclosed a copy of despatch No. 1 of May 26, 1943, from the Consulate at Kweilin92 in regard to the seizure and detention by the Chinese Special Service Police at Kweilin of Mr. Sa Kungliao, a former newspaper manager and editor.
Mr. Sa is described in the despatch as a well-known liberal who has for some years been associated with movements unsympathetic to the Kuomintang and who has consequently been on the Kuomintang’s blacklist. Formerly manager of a liberal publication at Hong Kong, he has been living in retirement at Kweilin since the fall of Hong Kong.
It is stated in the despatch that his seizure arose from the circumstance that he introduced two Chinese residents at Kweilin suspected by the Kuomintang of receiving funds from the Soviet authorities for subversive activities to two Soviet military officers of the Soviet [Page 267] Embassy at Chungking during the latters’ recent visit to Kweilin. (It is rumored at Chungking that Mr. Sa was “guilty of giving too many dinners for foreigners” and that he was considered to be successively a spy for the British, the Soviet Russians and the Americans.) The Consulate’s informants believe that the charges against the two suspect Chinese are patently false. Shortly after Mr. Sa introduced the two parties to each other he was kidnapped by the Special Service Police and taken to a concentration camp where he is said to be detained pending the receipt by the Police of further instructions from Chungking.
It is indicated in the despatch that this action has convinced liberal elements at Kweilin that any open criticism of the Central Government authorities will be ruthlessly suppressed, by illegal means if necessary. These elements maintain that the conflict is not merely between the Kuomintang and the Communists but between the Kuomintang and all dissenting groups in China regardless of their importance.
The Embassy is of the opinion that this reported action is but further evidence of the Kuomintang’s resolve to maintain its power by the suppression of any opposing elements. There does not now exist in China any political group, except for the Communist Party, which is of sufficient power and importance effectively to oppose the Kuomintang. The Communist Party strongly believes that its army represents the only guarantee against its liquidation. Due to the present lack of any important liberal group and to the widespread use by the Kuomintang of its secret police, it would seem to be extremely difficult for any movement among purely liberal and democratic groups to make any progress in their efforts to achieve a position of power so long as that position threatened the control of the Kuomintang.
Any effective threat to Kuomintang control as exerted at present would, therefore, seem to be possible only from the Communists, from a break-up of the Kuomintang itself or from the withdrawal of support by various military groups within the army. Given the temper of liberal elements within China and with a continuation of present circumstances, the Communist Party might draw to it in a United Front effort the support of democratic groups in China. The Communists themselves feel that there are such groups with which they would be willing and able to cooperate and which may in time be driven to such action by the Kuomintang’s present policy. A split-up of the Kuomintang or the ascendency to power within the Party of its more liberal elements with the consequent decrease in the influence of the reactionary “CC” clique would similarly represent an improvement in the position of all liberal elements in China. The possibility of military factions striving for control after the war [Page 268] cannot, however, be dismissed, for with the continued conserving of Chinese military strength, which is now felt by many observers to exist, and the delivery to the Chinese armed forces of additional Lend-Lease equipment those who control the armies will be in a strong position to dictate terms to any opposing group. Such an outcome of the struggle for power in China is viewed as a distinct possibility by some Chinese who add that Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek would not in any case be eliminated from the scene but would remain as a symbol for those in power. There seems, however, at present, and probably until the end of a war from which China will emerge as one of the victorious United Nations, little likelihood of any change in the Kuomintang attitude and policy toward the liberal elements and in the existing political set-up.
Respectfully yours,
- Not printed.↩