Sunday, 9 January

Fine, sunny, quite cold

1. Military Attaché Guo reported that he met the head of the American military delegation, Lieutenant General Deane. According to him, when he was in Cairo, he originally made an arrangement with the Generalissimo and Mountbatten that from this month onwards, on the one hand the Chinese and British armies would attack Burma, and on the other hand the British and American navies and air forces would use much of their strength to attack the Nicobar Islands. But by now there has been no news and he is deeply worried.

2. Also, Admiral Fisher is willing to cable his naval captain to bring some necessities for me from Britain. Therefore, I cabled Chen Weicheng to buy a portable typewriter and a war map for me, and asked the naval captain to bring them to me. Normal things are scarce here, in particular during wartime.

3. The German broadcast said that the Red Cross had protested about the cruelty of the methods of war, hinting that the Allies bombarded the German cities. This is really ridiculous. When the Germans bombarded other countries, then why did the Red Cross say nothing? In modern war, no country can remain neutral, and not even one country’s organisation can be an exception.