740.0011 Pacific War/3813
Memorandum by the Director of the Office of Far Eastern Affairs (Hornbeck) to the Secretary of State
Mr. Secretary: In connection with the telegram which came from Chungking this morning20 regarding the orders issued in the name of General Stilwell to move United States Army headquarters from China to New Delhi, I feel it desirable now to call to your attention the record which appears on pages 4 and 5 of a part of a conversation which I had with Dr. T. V. Soong on September 28, 1943.21 Dr. Soong expressed great concern over the fact that General Stilwell’s ideas and those of the Chinese High Command did not harmonize, and he said that the Chinese feel “that Stilwell is uncooperative”. I did my best, of course, to point out to Dr. Soong that Stilwell and others on the American side have the same feeling in reverse, i. e. that the Chinese are uncooperative. It happens, however, that in relations between General Stilwell and Ambassador Gauss there has been a situation in which there is clear indication almost continuously of an attitude on Stilwell’s part suggestive either of obtuseness regarding or of indifference to the problems of cooperation. (The same seems to be the case as regards General Hearn.) You will remember that I mentioned to you recently a lengthy memorandum22 which Gauss had sent me bearing upon this point with citation of cases and circumstances.
The Army apparently has reasons which are fully satisfying to it in explanation of the move which Stilwell is now making. It would be more difficult, I think, for them to show good reason for ordering and executing this shift of headquarters without giving Gauss and this Department advance notice—in order that we might be prepared in advance to deal with the questions of political purport and implication which inevitably arise in connection with such a matter.
- Telegram No. 583, April 3, 10 a.m., from the Ambassador in China, supra.↩
- Foreign Relations, 1943, China, p. 133.↩
- Not found in Department files.↩