Nanking Embassy Files, Lot F 79, 800 Communist
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Minister-Counselor of Embassy in China (Clark)
George Yeh94 told me today, and C. H. Shen, Secretary to the Generalissimo, had told me the same thing yesterday, that it was commonly considered among Chinese that there was a sharp division between the Communists in China. There were the foreign Communists—the Wai Kung, or those in control in Manchuria—and the Tu Kung, or those native to China, such as Mao Tse Tung,95 Chou En-lai96 and Chu Teh97 There were sharp differences of opinion between these groups and I would notice that none of the native Communists had permitted themselves to be enticed to Manchuria in spite of the fact, said Yeh, that the Manchurian Communists had invited them no less than three times in the last six months to come to Chiamussu.
Dr. Yeh agreed with my thesis that given this situation, there was a considerable likelihood that even should Mukden fall there would not be an immediate Communist push south of the Great Wall. Time would be needed, he thought, to consolidate the Communist position in Manchuria and for the necessary accommodations with the intramural Communists.
(Shen, having covered almost exactly the same territory yesterday, would tend to confirm that such thought is prevalent in Chinese circles and that there may be a forlorn hope that even should there be continued Communist victories, they will eventually fall out among themselves.)
- Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs.↩
- Chairman of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party.↩
- Member of the Central Committee and Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party; head of the Chinese Communist delegation during the Marshall Mission negotiations, December 1945–November 1946.↩
- Commander in Chief of Chinese Communist armies.↩