893.00/5–1748
The Ambassador in China (Stuart) to the Secretary of State
[Received May 26.]
Sir: I have the honor to report on the activities of Mr. William C. Bullitt41 during his present visit to China. In general he has been saying quite openly to his Chinese friends that you have steadily hindered the policy of more adequate aid to China, especially in the matter of military advice, and this because of personal grudges; that most of the more responsible top-level men in the American Government, whom he mentions freely by name, and many of the leading Congressmen differ radically with you in these views; that Mr. Butterworth [Page 238] shares your anti-Chinese sentiments but that he and others more friendly in the Department are alike powerless to do other than follow your orders; that General Barr42 and I are both quite second-rate people who are entirely subservient to your wishes; that if the Chinese can only manage to hold on until after the coming Presidential elections they can count on the fuller measure of assistance which they require because Mr. Truman will not be reelected and the new policy can then be put into effect with the hearty support of an increasing number of American voters; and that some really first-class American general will be sent here to help them finish the Communist menace. Chinese—with their tendency to discern selfish motives in any one’s actions—draw the inference that Mr. Bullitt is hoping to be appointed the next Ambassador.
It is with no slight reluctance that I pass on this information to you, all the more so since my personal relations with Mr. Bullitt have been entirely friendly. But apart from the personal unpleasantness, this point-of-view tends to strengthen President Chiang and his more fascist type of associates in their reliance on military force—made possible now only by American material assistance—for crushing the Communist rebellion. It neutralizes all of my feeble efforts to urge him to adopt more liberal and democratic methods. As you are well aware, I have always contended that there is no use in any American fiscal of [or] economic aid to China unless the civil war can somehow be ended, and that the present leadership is apparently too inept or incompetent, too arbitrarily dominated by personal or political factors, to accomplish this without some considerable measure of American professional advice. But just as strongly do I feel that the Communist problem is fundamentally a social or human one and cannot be solved merely by armed force. In China the failure of the Government is not only because of faulty training, strategy and logistics. Even more it is the rapidly waning public confidence, the worsening morale among the troops, the mounting desire for reforms which it is generally believed can only be looked for under a change of personnel, and the unwillingness or inability of President Chiang to initiate the socialized policies which should win back popular support and improve the whole administrative system to the point where the common people prefer it to that of Communism and are willing to struggle and suffer in its maintenance. To encourage him to rely upon continuing American technical and material aid tends to confirm him in his worst faults and to thwart all efforts to modernize his thinking.
Even within the present framework two features stand out in my mind as useful. One is the reliance on well-planned publicity. I [Page 239] am looking forward eagerly to Mr. Bryan’s43 arrival. Another is the Rural Reconstruction program44 if it really can be primarily a training for citizenship kept free from C. C. Clique and other political interference.
Respectfully yours,