893.00/15354
Memorandum by the Deputy Director of the Office of Far Eastern Affairs (Ballantine) to the Under Secretary of State (Stettinius)
Mr. Stettinius: Reference is made to the oral request of your office for clarification of an allusion in a telegram from the Embassy at Chungking to the “blockade” of the areas occupied by the so-called Chinese Communists.
The principal Chinese Communist area is in north central Shensi Province and it covers approximately one-third of that Province. (There also exist throughout northern and central China, interspersed among the areas of the Japanese occupation and Chinese national troops, Communist forces which are carrying on guerrilla warfare [Page 309] against the Japanese.) Within the principal Shensi area the Communists have their “capital” (Yenan), and their own governmental organization. There is little direct and open communication with other parts of China. The Central Government at Chungking forbids the passage into that area of arms and ammunition, food, medicines, etc.
Our reports show that the blockade is enforced by an almost complete cordon around the area of Central Government troops and troops of various provincial leaders: Chungking’s own forces are south and southwest of the blockaded area, Ninghsia provincial forces are to the northwest, Suiyuan provincial forces are to the north, and Shansi provincial troops (and the Japanese) are to the east. The Embassy, as well as our military authorities in China, estimate that there are possibly more than 400,000 Central Government troops in this region. American military observers are of the opinion that the large numbers of Central Government troops—among them some of China’s best-trained and best-equipped troops—deployed in this area are not warranted by existing military considerations.
The Chinese Government evidently holds that the existence of a regime within China independent of the Central Government can not be indefinitely tolerated. A blockade has been instituted (1) to check extension of Communist influence to other areas, and (2) to prevent communication and trade between the Communists and other regions under the control of the Central Government. It should also be pointed out that the Chinese Government views the northwest as an area of considerable strategic importance—and it has in mind the Soviet Union and communication between the Soviet Union and the Communists, as well as the Japanese.
While the Embassy at Chungking believes that the Central Government intends eventually to eliminate the independent Communist regime, whether peacefully or by arms, the Embassy does not feel that liquidation of the Communists by military measures is likely to occur in the near future. Foreign Minister T. V. Soong, Ambassador Wei, and Ambassador to Great Britain Wellington Koo have all stated recently that the Communist question would not give rise to armed conflict. President Chiang Kai-shek stated in a speech before the Central Executive Committee in September last that the Communist question would be settled by political means.
This Government and our diplomatic and military representatives in China have been guided by the consideration that the Communist question is an internal one for China. However, at least two aspects of the question are of interest to us and to our allies in the war against Japan: (1) the damaging effect which anything resembling a civil war in China would have on the general war effort; and (2) the immobilization [Page 310] in the northwest of large numbers of troops (both Central Government and Communist) who might, it would seem, be employed to better advantage in the war against Japan on active fronts.