123 Ward, Angus: Telegram
The Ambassador in China (Stuart) to the Secretary of State
[Received June 2—12:06 a. m.]
1165. For Butterworth. ReDeptel 640, May 26. I also am deeply disturbed about status of Ward and his staff. Thinking that perhaps a personal letter from me to Chou En-lai would be beneficial in this respect I sent Philip Fugh61 to Huang Hua May 31 to see if latter would transmit such letter. Huang’s first reaction was negative. He said normal channel is through Clubb. However, he did promise to give my request further thought. Needless to say, I shall continue my efforts. (See Embtel 1111, May 25).
As respects whole question of Mukden ConGen, Huang insisted that it was outside his jurisdiction, but he did indicate his belief that its present situation may be explicable by other than surface facts. He hinted that Ward may have been doing espionage for Kmt. However, when pressed, he insisted he had no concrete information on this. I fear we must consider this comment revealing of Communists’ official attitude toward our Mukden office once they are publicly put on defensive. Huang added that if he were too active in matter he would be suspected by his superiors of yielding to pressure from me as old teacher and thus overstepping his authority. For obvious reasons Huang requested Fugh to keep this conversation strictly confidential.
- Chinese personal secretary to the Ambassador in China.↩