Monday, 13 October
At 8.00 a.m. in the morning we went to the United Memorial Week service. It was held in the hall of the Military Committee. Li Shizeng reported on why France had fallen, which was not solely because of the collapse of the army, as only two out of its five armies had been defeated. The remaining three remained intact. The navy and the air force suffered even fewer losses. France was defeated was due to political failure. Although the Radical Socialists were in the majority, they accepted minority parties. Therefore, there were many parties. The Monarchist Party also had substantial strength. So, although the governing party had a majority in parliament, if it could not to some extent meet the satisfaction of the people, according to the responsible parliamentary system, the governing party had to step down. Thus, the Monarchist Party took this opportunity to overthrow the Radical Socialists. This time Philippe Pétain and Maxime Weygand and others of the Monarchist Party united several small parties to attack the Radical Socialists’ cabinet, and took the chance to be in charge of the cabinet and surrender to Germany. Therefore Mr. Li thought that our country should take it as a lesson that before our country completely ended the stages of military rule and political tutelage, and the constitutional rule was not yet in full preparation, we must not implement constitutional rule. We should, in particular, not tolerate small parties. What he said seemed to be quite logical.
After I returned to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, we held a Memorial Week service for the Ministry. Originally Section Chief Zou was to make a report, but as he did not feel very well today I made a report instead. I relayed the words of Mr. Li in my report. In the afternoon, the Dutch Chargé d’Affaires, Bos, came. He repeated again the request of the Netherlands Government, demanding the withdrawal of our Consulate at Palembang, so as to prevent Japan from establishing a Consulate according to the treaty. I said I was not clear about the matter, and I had to study the issue before getting back to him. But:
1) He should compare the Chinese expatriates in Palembang with Japanese because the Japanese expatriates are insignificant in number while there are many Chinese there.
2) During this period that A, B, C, and D should be united, China and the Netherlands should cooperate to resist Japanese aggression. Others would see this action as the Netherlands intending to sacrifice China to pacify Japan. The Chinese would certainly not excuse this.
3) The Netherlands should be stern towards aggressors, as there is no end to the aggressors’ appetite.
4) In the Dutch East Indies, there are still many places with Chinese expatriates but no Japanese expatriates. So if there was any place where our country had a Consulate and Japan made the same demand, then I wonder if our Consulates and the Consulates of other countries should evacuate too? Such a bad example should not be introduced. I asked him to:
1) check the numbers of Japanese expatriates and Chinese expatriates and get back to me,
2) list in table form and forward to me the places where Chinese Consulates were available while Japanese Consulates were absent in the Dutch East Indies, also to specify in the table the numbers of Japanese expatriates and Chinese expatriates so that I can study and get back to him.
He declared repeatedly that such action from the Netherlands Government had absolutely no bad intentions towards the Chinese. The Netherlands was wholly asking for our assistance in coping with Japan. I promised that I would consider this but I hinted that he should not expect I could give him a satisfactory answer. In the evening, I reported the whole thing to Guo Taiji, and he agreed with what I had replied.