Foreign Relations of the United States, 1946, The Far East: China, Volume X

Marshall Mission Files, Lot 54–D270

Minutes of Meeting Between General Marshall, Dr. Stuart, Mr. Tung Pi-wu, and Mr. Wang Ping-nan at No. 5 Ning Hai Road, Nanking, October 8, 1946, 4 p.m.

Nanking, October 8, 1946, 4 p.m.

Also present:	Colonel Caughey
	Captain Soong
	Mister Wu

General Marshall: Doctor Stuart brought me Chou En Lai’s reply immediately after you gave it to him, and I sent a copy to the Generalissimo. Doctor Stuart told me of his remarks to you at the time of the delivery of this statement and there is no necessity of my repeating what he has already said. I only wish to add that I am completely baffled as to what your position is now. Doctor Stuart and I have made exhaustive efforts to get the Generalissimo’s agreement to halting the offensive against Kalgan and to his agreement to as much as 10 days of the truce. So I repeat again that I am baffled by your Yenan reply. What concerns me most is that when Doctor Stuart and I were utilizing every pressure at our command, to halt the operations against Kalgan, we were told frequently that the Communist reaction would be one of further complications, that General Chou’s statement in his memorandum to me of 30 September, in the last paragraph of which he expressed certain demands, would be immediately followed by other complications. I disavowed that because it seemed to me that what the Communist Party evidently desired was the cessation of the advance against Kalgan, and that is what I was talking about. Apparently I was entirely wrong, judging from this, and certainly Doctor Stuart was wrong judging from his comments to me resulting from his conversations with you two gentlemen.

In early August, Doctor Stuart and I proposed a certain procedure, the Five Man Group, in the hope that the initiation of that meeting would provide us with some basis for forcing an arrangement for the conclusion of hostilities. Yenan twisted that into a Government effort to provide delay as a cover for their campaign. You evidently did not believe us when we told you that that was purely our proposal and it was only with great difficulty we got the Generalissimo to agree to it. As a result of this attitude, certainly there have been delays during which military operation[s] have proceeded. Greater delays could not have been possible under the proposal of Doctor Stuart and myself.

Now here again Doctor Stuart and I make a definite effort, far greater than you gentlemen evidently comprehend, to obtain what General Chou was asking for, with this futile result.

Now: It was to be assumed from the documents in the case and the statements made that you were desirous of having the offensive operations against Kalgan halted at the earliest possible moment and yet two days have elapsed, during which the operations go on, before we obtained any reply. General Chou remains in Shanghai to make the negotiations the more difficult. My question is, “What now do you expect of Doctor Stuart and myself, if anything?”

Mister Tung: In the past we did not have any misunderstanding of your, General Marshall’s and Doctor Stuart’s, efforts for peace but later, when the Government agreed to the Five Man Group, it was not made clear as to one point because the Government insisted upon putting the question of cease firing to discussion in the State Council.

General Marshall: That is incorrect.

Mister Tung: The foregoing statement was made by the Government representatives, Wu Teh Chen and Chang Li-sheng, personally to me.

General Marshall: I corrected the misunderstanding in a direct statement.

Mister Tung: There was a difference of opinion between the Government and you and Doctor Stuart. For a long time we did not get any assurances for cease firing so the proposal remains without any result.

General Marshall: I gave the Communist Party, in writing, the Generalissimo’s statement regarding the Committee of Three and regarding the local Government issue.

Doctor Stuart: And I explained that Mr. Wu and Mr. Chang were instructed to deal only with the Five Man Committee and the matters of the State Council membership and the veto; and that they had no instructions to deal with anything else. As soon as the State Council issue was satisfactorily agreed upon the Three Man Committee would meet at once and deal with the military aspect.

Mister Tung: But Mister Wu and Mister Chang did not understand the matter as you have just explained it.

Doctor Stuart: But I gave them that understanding. At the time I took the responsibility of obtaining the understanding, I also asked those two men if I was correct and they said yes.

General Marshall: I also brought back from Kuling from the Generalissimo the statement that those two gentlemen were to discuss, the representation and the veto questions, that what the Generalissimo would not permit them to do was to negotiate outside of a formal meeting. General Chou had been asking Doctor Stuart to negotiate the points at issue before the meeting actually took place.

Doctor Stuart: And that is what I told them.

General Marshall: I also informed General Chou En Lai that the proposal for the meeting and the points to be discussed came from Doctor Stuart and me and, therefore, the delegates would not have been instructed to discuss the military issues.

Mister Tung: Regarding the issue of cessation of hostilities, great confusion has been aroused back and forth and memoranda were exchanged on that point. Finally it was learned that the Government could not give the guarantee of cease fire, neither could General Marshall or Doctor Stuart. So it has been delayed on that account.

Mister Wang: The main point at issue is the guarantee of the cessation of hostilities. We could not obtain such guarantee either from the Government or the mediators. Therefore, we could not go ahead with the proposal. This point has been made many many times before.

Mister Tung: General Marshall and Dr. Stuart’s efforts are explained to us in one way by you gentlemen. However, the Government action gives a different explanation of your efforts in this proposal. General Marshall has said that the Communist Party felt this proposal was brought up by the Government, not by the mediators. That is what the Government offers as explanation of your efforts in this proposal. That is the reason we have not been able to accept.

Regarding this point, General Chou’s memorandum dated 30 September demanded the Government not to attack Kalgan. As a result of General Marshall’s and Doctor Stuart’s efforts you have obtained a 10-day truce, however that is not what we expected. We want to have a complete stop in the offensive against Kalgan. This also includes the vicinity of Kalgan—the operation against those areas must also cease. If the Government is really sincere in their attitude then they should withdraw their troops to their original position.

During this 10 day truce, the Government could very well take other steps although offensive operations cease—they could reinforce their troops. Therefore, in case the Communists do not accept the arrangement the Government is in a position ready to attack again.

General Marshall: They cannot do that. By doing that they would break the truce and American officers would report it.

Mister Tung: Nonetheless, that is our point of view.

General Marshall: I stipulated that the American officer member of the team could go wherever he wanted to. He was the sole decider. The crucial part of the truce was that the American officer would go wherever he wanted to and whenever he wanted to. I insisted upon that because I anticipated that the Communists would say just what has been said and I was certain the Government would say the same thing about the Communists. The only protection possible was that the American officer would go here and there and tell me what was being done and whether everything was being carried out in good faith.

Mister Tung: There was a field team in Kalgan which was withdrawn very recently. Now, a great many field teams are in Peiping.

General Marshall: They are ready with planes to go out to special points, of which I have already been notified. I merely mean to illustrate that I do not think your argument is a sound one. The Government has exactly the same fears of the Communists—that the Communists would profit from the 10 day delay and regroup their people.

Mister Tung: I would like to repeat our viewpoint. We want a cessation of the attack on Kalgan indefinitely. As General Chou has expressed before, the Government should follow their sincerity by their deeds—by facts. Regarding Kalgan, the only way the Government can show its sincerity is by withdrawing their troops to the original position. That is our viewpoint. I would like to hear yours.

In the memorandum from General Marshall and Dr. Stuart to the Communist Delegation informing them about the 10 day truce it is said that the Communists should immediately carry out the two suggestions in the Generalissimo’s memorandum. We feel that this demand is actually an expression of the victor over the vanquished. It is not an attitude which should be expressed by a party negotiating with another equal party. In the June discussions almost 90% of all difficulties were ironed out, but the Government wanted to carry on their program of fighting, therefore we did not secure the final agreement. Today, under similar circumstances, the Communists feel that they cannot accept that proposal.

As to the discussion after the fighting stops, both sides should be able to determine what should be discussed—not merely one side saying what will be taken up.

Regarding the Generalissimo’s memorandum dated October 2nd, the reason General Chou is delaying answering this memorandum is that he hoped that through the efforts of General Marshall and Dr. Stuart, the Government would be made to realize this condition and change their war policy. Now, we have found out that such effort has been carried out by Dr. Stuart and General Marshall already and we have lost our hope. General Chou is now preparing a reply to the Generalissimo.

We appreciate very much the efforts of General Marshall and Dr. Stuart and their position in mediating the Chinese internal affairs, but today China is in a very serious turmoil of civil war. We hope General Marshall and Dr. Stuart can on one hand report to the United States Government to stop its one-sided aid to the Chinese Government and on the other hand we hope General Marshall and Dr. Stuart can have a fair mediating process which would be acceptable by both sides.

General Marshall: My reply to that is I don’t accept the statement regarding the United States Government and I don’t like the inference of the second portion of your statement. My impression at the present time is that I very much fear my efforts in negotiations have terminated. That is all I have to say.

Doctor Stuart: I would like to add something else. The question of good faith of the Government in regard to the operations around Kalgan seems to be amply provided for by the arrangement of the field teams going to Communist territory and to Government territory. This protection is for the Communist troops and assures that the Government troops would keep good faith, because American commanders of the field teams would report at once any violation.

In the 10 day truce period, if the discussion went satisfactorily for the State Council and the other political issues there would be a continued discussion of the military affairs, all of which, if both sides wanted to cooperate in a coalition government and the plan for the constitution, that the cease-fire would have followed very quickly. We took the responsibility in this last proposal of seeing that good faith was kept on both sides throughout the truce and whatever would grow out of the truce in continuing the mediation. Therefore, we feel that the Communists have repudiated our proposal rather than any question of the Government and I don’t see that there is anything more that we can possibly even try to do.

Mister Tung: I understand everything you said. Judging from past experiences, we don’t think this 10 day truce will be of any avail. Under this new proposal the 10 day truce can hardly be sufficient because there will be delays from numerous sources and consequently no result can be accomplished.

Secondly, the Government’s condition is that we accept this 10 day truce and we must execute all demands. Such an attitude, including this proposal cannot be accepted by the Communist Party.

Mister Wang: We cannot accept the two conditions in this proposal. One, the 10 day truce and, two, the condition that we must carry out these two points in the Generalissimo’s demand.

Doctor Stuart: There may be some misunderstanding about that. I would like to try to clear that up. We considered that this was above the plane of victor and vanquished into a conference where the Americans as mediators would try to see that the truce was carried out in the spirit of cooperation in order to find a mutually satisfactory solution in matters like the State Council, National Assembly and the Draft Constitution. As the Government had evidence of the readiness of the Communists to cooperate in matters of this sort, it would naturally lead to the settling of the military issues dealing with the cessation of fighting around Kalgan and elsewhere on a permanent basis. We believe that that would be the outcome.

Mister Tung: These 10 days actually facilitate the operations of the Government.

Mister Wang: What we need is an expression of sincerity. At the present time the Government can express their sincerity by restoring their troops to their original positions, they can express it by deeds. We agreed to the meeting and we also hope a satisfactory result can be obtained from such a conference. However, if we only confine the discussion to the two points brought forward by the Generalissimo, there can be no result.

Mister Tung: I will transmit the contents of this conversation with you today to General Chou En-lai. Mr. Wang and I came here today to discuss certain matters pertaining to the mediation. I merely represent General Chou En-lai in this matter. General Marshall is the chairman of the Committee of Three and General Chou is also a member of the committee. General Chou will come back to Nanking in the future and he will make a reply to the Generalissimo and also take up this discussion with you and Dr. Stuart, personally.

Doctor Stuart: I would like to say one more thing. We proposed the Committee of Five. The Communists then wanted the Committee of Three and then they wanted the attack against Kalgan to stop. Now this proposal that we have made includes all those three matters; the attack on Kalgan stops, the Committee of Five and the Committee of Three meet. We expected rather hopefully that in those 10 days there would be a start which would lead to all the other things that we believe both sides want. The tragedy of this whole issue, the heartbreaking tragedy, is that each side fears the other. Everything that the Communists said today about the Government, we hear from the Government side about the Communists. Yet we believe both sides can come together by trusting each other and trusting us a little more and can find a solution if they are only willing to make a start. We thought of this truce as making a start to accomplish everything both sides wanted.

Mister Tung: The Communist Party first asked for the guarantee of the cessation of hostilities. Only through the failure of that guarantee did they request the Committee of Three.