Tuesday, 29 August

Fine

At 5.00 p.m. American Ambassador Harriman came to talk about the reception for representative Donald Nelson and Patrick Hurley. Originally I planned that the day after they arrived I would hold a grand welcome party for them and invite the Soviet authorities and the people in the Diplomatic Corps to accompany them. But Harriman said since he was the host here, this type of big party should be organised by him first. But there was little time left. Therefore he suggested that I should change my schedule to a luncheon on Friday and only invite people from the British and American Embassies to accompany him. I said that since I received a telegram from Vice-President H.H. Kung, asking me to show our greetings I had prepared to organise a grander banquet. Now if Harriman had difficulty with this, I would certainly be happy to change it accordingly into a luncheon. Ambassador Harriman also said that he did not even know that they would come to Moscow. He did not know what the idea behind their visit was either. However, since these two people represented the United States they should have important communication with Chairman Chiang, and they should clearly understand the Sino-Soviet relationship and it was necessary for them to visit Moscow. Also he hoped that both Nelson and Hurley could have a long talk with me because according to Harriman’s personal experience, with regard to the Soviet-Allies and Soviet-Sino relations, what I said in the past was very just and afterwards my judgement has been proven right. Therefore he respected me very much. So when the two of them passed here he hoped I could talk to them. I thanked him for his good idea and said I was flattered. He mentioned the peace organisation proposal, saying that the British and American proposals have already been handed to the Soviet side, but the Soviet proposal has been handed over to Secretary of State Hull by the Soviet Ambassador. The American Foreign Office asked him to obtain a copy from the Soviet side, but until now the Soviet Foreign Office hasn’t given it to him. It meant Kerr hasn’t received it yet. He said he could give me a copy of the American proposal, but asked me to keep it secret. He asked me whether the Chinese side had another proposal or not, and I told him I did not know, but I suspected that China would not have such detailed proposals as Britain and the United States. It was likely that the Chinese one would express its opinions on the British and American proposals. Harriman thought this would be an extremely clever move because Secretary of State Hull was particularly concerned with regard to American interest in China. He asked me about Xinjiang and the Chinese Communist Party. I told him something about it.

In the evening, I invited the Icelandic Minister, P. Benediktsson, the Uruguay Minister, D. E. Frugoni, Admiral Archer and W. Davis, and I asked Military Attaché Guo, Shaozhou and Jingchen to accompany us. Admiral Archer told us quite a few interesting stories about Churchill when the latter was in the navy. He also said that when the British King served in the navy, he got on very well with colleagues. He was classmate of the British King at the naval academy. Archer was honest and sincere. When I asked him about the war, he always answered me straightforwardly.