Tuesday, 4 January
Dull, with sleet
I received a telegram from Chen Bulei, saying that the Generalissimo has read my report that I sent to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which was about editorials published in the War and Working Class magazine, the failure of the League of Nations, as well as comments on the Moscow Conference. The Generalissimo instructed these reviews should be immediately reprinted for our newspapers. So he asked me to cable him their abstracts in more detail. Perhaps the Generalissimo knows that there is an apparent change in Soviet attitude towards China, so our public opinion should accommodate this and understand that China and the Soviet Union should be on friendly terms. I immediately did accordingly.
I also received Vice-President Kung’s telegram. He asked me to relay his New Year greetings to Stalin, Molotov, Mikoyan, along with his congratulations on the Four Power Declaration and his regards for Sino-Soviet cooperation in the future. I immediately asked Shaozhou to translate the telegram into Russian and asked him to send it to the Secretary of the Foreign Office, Litvinov, this noon.
Last night I still could not sleep properly and I thought probably it was because I had taken medicine for my arthritis. I dreamt again that a certain lady was cold towards me. This was the result of a rift in our ages. An English saying goes that the most tragic thing in the world is to engage in love in middle age. I am doubtful about that and I cheered myself up.
Yesterday the Soviet army recovered Olevsk and went beyond the old Polish border. This is the first time that the German army has been pushed out of Soviet territory since the German-Soviet war.
The Generalissimo’s oil portrait was completed by the painter, V. E. Pamfilov. The spirit is wonderful. It is very difficult for foreigners to paint Chinese portraits like this. He only asked for 5,000 rubles for the cost of the oil paint and so on, but the procedure was very complicated. Soviet painters need to have permission from the Government to draw portraits for foreigners, and also for this purpose the Government organised a committee. Permission was granted by it. I was told that after the oil portrait was finished, it was reviewed by the Art Association. Everyone there thought it was good and then it was sent to me today.
In the evening, Attaché Hu Jibang came to talk to me. She is researching planned economy at Moscow University and has already amassed substantial material. She will obtain a Masters degree in two years. She likes to learn and her work in the Embassy is quite good. Aside from her work in the Embassy and study at the university, she has also learnt English because I told her that for economics research she had to learn English as well. In the Soviet Union, those books whose ideas do not conform to its political ideas are not allowed to be published. So it is impossible to investigate worldwide economic theories and economic conditions. The scope would be too narrow. She is very smart and strives to learn so much, I think she should be able to achieve something.