Foreign Relations of the United States, 1947, The Far East: China, Volume VII

761.93/12–847

The Assistant Chief of the Division of Chinese Affairs (Rice) to the Director of the Office of Far Eastern Affairs (Butterworth)⁹²

[Washington,] December 18, 1947.

Subject: Factors Presently and Prospectively Working for and Against a Sino-Soviet Rapprochement

Reference: Mr. Butterworth’s Memorandum of December 8, 1947,⁹³ requesting that a study be made on the above subject.

Summary and Conclusions: On balance, it appears unlikely that a rapprochement between China and the Soviet Union will eventuate while Chiang Kai-shek and like-minded leaders retain substantial control of the Chinese Government. A genuine rapprochement would have to be based upon a substantial common ground of political, economic, or military self-interest. As will be seen from the following discussion of the chief factors involved, the regimes in power in the two countries have few mutual political interests and are not economically interdependent. While the USSR did extend a measure of aid to the Chinese Government when both countries were menaced by Japan, the utter defeat of the latter power has served largely to destroy the military usefulness of the Chinese Government to the Soviet Union. Conceivably, the present Chinese Government might seek a rapprochement with the USSR, despite the considerations referred to above, if under sufficiently strong domestic or foreign pressure to do so. However, a time when the Chinese Government faces so desperate a situation that it must clutch at the straw of Soviet aid is precisely a time when the Chinese Communists might most easily seize power. That consummation probably would please the USSR more than would the concessions to be had in exchange for aid to the Chinese Government. The fact that no lasting rapprochement with the USSR resulted from the Sino-Soviet Treaty of 1945, which was negotiated by China under foreign pressure, is likely at once to make China’s foreign friends unwilling to suggest another attempt and to render the Chinese Government unreceptive to such suggestion were it to be made.

While the Government of Chiang Kai-shek appears unlikely to effect a rapprochement with the USSR, it appears that the substance of power is slipping from the grasp of that Government. As the forces to the left of the Government are apparently gaining ground at its expense, the most likely assumption is that it will be succeeded either by a Communist regime or by a coalition in which the Communists will exercise much power. A Communist regime would almost certainly seek to ally China with the USSR; a coalition government which included the Communists probably would seek a rapprochement with the USSR (end of Summary and Conclusions).

I. Factors Tending To Encourage Sino-Soviet Reapprochement

1. Similar Views With Respect to Japan.

It is clear from the numerous Chinese official statements and press comment on the subject that there exists a well-nigh general Chinese fear that Japan may again become an aggressive and powerful nation capable of posing an economic, political, and military challenge to China. It will be equally evident from a consideration of Russo-Japanese relations over the past half century and from post-war Soviet maneuvers, that the USSR seeks to prevent the renaissance of Japan as a non-Communist military power. Similarly, the USSR and China share a common interest in forcing Japan to pay as heavy reparations as possible in order that Japan may be more nearly neutralized thereby and in order that each claimant may receive a larger total amount of Japanese reparations.

Accordingly, on the question of treatment of Japan, China and the USSR find themselves aligned side-by-side against what they apparently conceive to be the position which the U. S. is in the logic of circumstances bound to assume.

2. Consciousness of Chinese Impotence vis-à-vis the USSR and Chinese War-weariness.

The borders of the USSR encircle China through an arc of 180 degrees; China would be unable to repel any large-scale invasion from across this long frontier. There remains in existence no power other than the U. S. sufficiently strong to serve the Chinese as a substantial counterweight against the Soviets. Accordingly, should it appear to Chinese leaders that the U. S. is not a factor in the situation of sufficient weight to counterbalance the USSR, China might be expected to consider whether (1) to seek additional counterpoise by appealing to the UN, or (2) to seek a rapprochement with the Soviets. Chinese will recall, in this connection, that their appeals to the League of Nations in a somewhat analogous situation in 1932 proved vain.⁹⁴ Therefore, Chinese Government leaders, in the event that their position vis-à-vis the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communists becomes clearly desperate, might conclude that they have no recourse but to seek a rapprochement with the Soviets. The more intelligent Government leaders would fully realize this to be a policy of grasping at straws. However, such action might appeal to some who believe China’s civil strife to consist primarily of an extension of the world struggle between the US and USSR,^* and to the many war-weary Chinese who would hope thereby to be removed from between the upper and nether mill-stones of Government-Communist civil strife.

3. Likelihood that Present Chinese Government Will Be Succeeded by One More Friendly to the USSR.

It is clear that the position of the Chinese Government is deteriorating and that it may either fall or be reduced to the status of a regional regime; it is also manifest that President Chiang is not immortal. The leaders who succeed Chiang Kai-shek may be as anti-Soviet as he is, but they may also be distinctly less so. If the next Chinese Government is Communist, we may expect it to ally China with the Soviet Union. If the Chiang Government is succeeded by one composed principally of leaders of the Democratic League and of such ex-militarists as Feng Yu-hsiang, Li Chi-shen and Tsai Ting-kai, we might expect it to attempt to obtain understandings with the CCP and with the USSR. As already indicated, such attempts might find wide support among the many war-weary Chinese who think that Sino-Soviet rapprochement might end civil war and prevent China’s becoming a battleground in a third world war.

II. Factors Tending To Prevent Sino-Soviet Rapprochement

1. Relationship of CCP to USSR.

Perhaps the most important factor presently creating antagonism between China and the USSR is the Chinese Communist Party, which Chinese Government leaders identify with the Soviet Union. The role of the USSR in encouraging that Party’s growth is, of course, well-known to Chinese Government leaders: it will be recalled that Russian agents directly participated in CCP actively in the 1920’s; that CCP leaders were in touch with the Comintern during the 1930’s;^† that during the occupation in 1945 of Manchuria by Soviet forces, entry into that region of CCP forces and their access to arms were facilitated; and that many Chinese Government leaders are convinced that the USSR is presently giving active aid to the CCP and its armed forces. The deadly bitterness which Chinese Government leaders feel toward their Chinese Communist enemies is naturally extended to the USSR in direct ratio to the measure of blame which they apportion to the Soviet Union for the existence and activities of the Chinese Communist Party.

2. The Soviet Attitude Toward Chiang Kai-shek.

So long as Chiang Kai-shek remains in power, the Soviet leaders are bound, in considering possible changes in the Soviet policy toward China, to give substantial weight to the basically anti-Soviet attitude of Chiang Kai-shek. It will be recalled that Chiang Kai-shek was the leader of the rightest coup of 1927, following which Russian agents were killed or driven from the country, and that during the succeeding decade he pursued a strongly anti-Communist domestic policy. The Soviets are also well aware that Chiang Kai-shek employed a German military mission, during most of that decade, which exercised a substantial anti-Communist influence. They may also know that Chiang sought a Sino-German alliance directed again the USSR, which failed to materialize because Hitler preferred the alliance with Japan.^‡ In any case, they know that he is anything but an enthusiastic friend of the Soviet Union.

Soviet aid to the Chinese Government during the Sino-Japanese war was of course based upon Soviet desire to see Japan kept militarily occupied in China in order that it might be less likely to launch an attack on the USSR. The utter defeat of Japan virtually destroyed the usefulness to the USSR of the Chinese Government; that they now would be pleased to see it overthrown is indicated by the numerous propaganda blasts which in recent months have been directed against it from Moscow. This Soviet propaganda, and China counter-propaganda, are primarily the results of other divisive factors in Sino-Soviet relations, but they themselves leave an increment of enmity.

3. Soviet Imperialism.

Among the prime factors creating antagonism between China and the USSR are the history of Russian expansion at China’s expense and fears that further expansion of that nature may be anticipated. It will be recalled that: (1) Tanna Tuva, formerly claimed by China, was about two years ago made an oblast of the USSR after having passed from Chinese control and through a period of “independence”; (2) China, at the instance of the USSR, on January 5, 1946, recognized the “independence” of Outer Mongolia, which China formerly claimed;⁹⁵ (3) the USSR controlled Sinkiang Province during the period 1934–1942 and bears a measure of responsibility for the present situation in that Province; (4) the USSR has since 1945 exercised unilateral control over the Port Arthur naval base area and Dairen, and that protracted Sino-Soviet negotiations for the establishment of a Chinese administration there thus far have proved fruitless;⁹⁶ and (5) the USSR, by virtue of the Sino-Soviet Treaty of August 14, 1945, has exacted from China economic concessions with respect to Manchuria which might be expected to impede full exercise of Chinese economic control and political sovereignty over that area.^§ (In fact, a reading of that Treaty conveys the impression that it has made for China more problems than it solved and that attempts to implement it may be expected to create much Sino-Soviet friction and ill-will.)

In view of Korea’s past subordination to China and the strategic role which it has at various times played as buffer against or bridge for conquests, China is bound also to regard with concern present Soviet efforts to dominate that country.

4. The Residue of Mutual Ill-will Created By Soviet Behaviour In Manchuria 1945–1946 And By Chinese Reprisals Against Soviet Citizens.

It will be recalled that Manchuria’s industrial establishment suffered direct damage, during Soviet occupation of that area in 1945 and 1946, estimated by the Pauley Mission at $858,100,000—much of it as the result of Soviet removal of equipment.^║ According to numerous reports, the Chinese officials who entered areas of Manchuria occupied by Soviet forces in order to establish an administration there as provided by the Sino-Soviet Treaty and Agreements of August 14, 1945, found themselves mortifyingly impotent in the face of Soviet obstructionism. It will also be recalled that acts of depredation carried out by Soviet troops against the populace of Manchuria during the same period produced a hatred of Russia affecting most classes in large sections of that area. This bitter antipathy in turn resulted in savage reprisals by Chinese troops and civilians against Soviet citizens in Manchuria.^¶ These developments have left in official and non-official quarters a heavy residue of mutual ill-will which may be expected for some time to come to exercise a substantial divisive influence between the two countries.

5. Lack of Substantial Economic Inter-dependence.

There is basis for close and important economic relationships between the Soviet Union and areas of Manchuria and Sinkiang adjacent to the USSR. Such areas, however, are for the most part held by Chinese Communists or by Sinkiang rebel elements. Areas under the control of the Chinese Government are in general not dependent upon the USSR as a market for their produce or as a source of essential commodities. (While the USSR has in recent years taken substantial quantities of Chinese tea, wool, tungsten, and other raw materials, a large proportion of these materials were accepted in payment for war materiel supplied China early in the war.)

While two politically incompatible regimes may find that their economic interdependence makes mutual tolerance desirable, such a motive would appear to be largely lacking in the relations of the Chinese and Soviet Governments.

92. Initialed by the Chief of the Division (Ringwalt).
93. Not printed.
94. For invocation by China against Japan of article 11 of the League of Nations Covenant, see telegram No. 118, September 21, 1931, 5 p.m., from the Consul at Geneva, Foreign Relations, 1931, vol. iii, p. 24. For invocation by China of articles 10 and 15, see telegram No. 50, January 29, 1932, 9 a.m., from the Consul at Geneva, ibid., 1932, vol. iii, p. 90. Correspondence regarding the part played by the League of Nations in the hostilities between Japan and China, during 1931 and 1932, is scattered through chapters on the Far Eastern Crisis, ibid., 1931, vol. iii , and 1932, vols. iii and iv .
95. Thus Minister for Economic Affairs, Chen Chi-tien, is quoted as having on December 13, 1947, described China’s civil war as “an international struggle preceding a third world war.”—Tsinan, China, A. P. despatch of December 13. [Footnote in the original.]
96. Snow, Red Star Over China, pp. 414–415; 421–422. [Footnote in the original.]
97. This is an instance of the favorite Chinese strategy of “Allying with those that are afar to defeat those who are near,” which enabled the first Ch’in Emperor to consolidate China’s feudal kingdoms and found the Chinese Empire, (cf. Berlin’s secret despatch no. 2007, Feb. 18, 1946, on subject, “Transmission of Chinese Document from Marshal Chiang Kai-shek to Adolf Hitler.”) [Footnote in the original; despatch not printed.]
95. Foreign Relations, 1946, vol. x, p. 1223.
96. For correspondence on this subject, see pp. 481 ff.
97. CF. OIR Report no. 4519, Oct. 1. 1947, “The Chinese Changchun Railway Agreement as a Basis for Soviet Expansion in Manchuria”. [Footnote in the original; report not printed.]
98. Dept of State Press Release no. 907, Dec. 13, 1946. [Footnote in the original; see Department of State Bulletin, December 22, 1946, p. 1154.]
99. Embassy’s report 126, Sept. 17, 1946, and despatch 319, Dec. 6, 1946, respectively transmitting Mukden’s despatch to Nanking no. 31, Aug. 30, 1946, and Changchun’s despatch to Nanking no. 11, Nov. 20, 1946. [Footnote in the original; despatches not printed.]