Wednesday, 2 February

Dull

At twelve noon, I paid a visit to the Canadian Minister Wilgress. He told me that with regard to the Soviet proposal last night, probably this was initiated by the British denial of the Soviet suggestion that those countries within the Republics under the Soviet Union that suffered most could dispatch representatives to attend a conference for the trial of war criminals. It happened that the year before last the occupied small states in Europe, because of the atrocities committed by German armies within the borders of their countries, asked the British and Soviet Governments to organise a committee to judge the cases. After the British Government was in touch with these countries, it raised a concrete proposal, but the Soviet Union did not respond to the proposal until June. It suggested two points. 1) It did not advocate that the United States would be the permanent Chairman, but instead the position should be rotational. 2) Britain proposed that besides the Dominions participating, India and Burma could also dispatch representatives to join, because many Burmese people had suffered this time. The Soviet Union was not against it, but it said that within the Soviet Union Republics, the suffering is much greater than any other areas, therefore they should have representatives to take part too. Britain replied in September refusing the Soviet request, saying the Dominions usually have their independent diplomatic rights, but the Soviet Union Republics are not independent states, and according to the Soviet constitution they do not have this special right. At the same time the Canadian Government also dispatched Minister Wilgress to explain to Molotov, saying that Canada joining international conferences and signing treaties with foreign countries had not stemmed from the Paris Peace Conference, so its status is different from the Soviet Union Republics. The Soviet Union was not satisfied with this explanation, saying India is not independent, let alone Burma, so there is no point Britain denying it. But the British Government did not wait to solve this difficult problem, and disregarding whether the Soviet Union would join or not, started the conference in London in October. The Soviet Union was very angry with this arrangement. In October, it issued a memorandum to inform the British Government (also sent to Canada on 5 November), and filed a serious protest. With regard to this matter the British Government did not want those excluded to know, so Lord Simon did not tell other members of the conference. Therefore Minister Wilgress asked me to keep it as top secret. Minister Wilgress personally thought that it was a mistake that Britain had mentioned Burma in the past, but this move by the Soviet Union surely put Britain and the United States in an extremely difficult situation. On the British and American sides, the bad effect of this incident is the same as the Cairo rumour incident, the cooperation among the Allies is worrying. He also said that the Canadian representative in London had talked to the Polish Prime Minister Mikolajczyk, he thought that the Polish attitude was quite stern. What was most difficult for Britain and the United States was that legally they had no choice but to recognise all these exile governments as legitimate governments. But in the past few years, there have been so many anti-German and progressive elements cropping up like mushrooms, but the exiled governments have lost contact with them, not only is Poland like this, the same also goes for Yugoslavia. Fortunately, the British Government realised this early enough and cooperated with the Soviet Union and turned around to support Tito. All in all, the situation for Britain and the United States, and both Roosevelt and Churchill originally from the military wasplacing too much emphasis on the military and ignoring politics. They always thought from the militarist viewpoint of military needs, they always manipulated anti-reactionary elements, people in the world would deem Britain and the United States as powers supportive of anti-reactionary elements in the future, and see the Soviet Union as the only one that  was supportive of progressive elements. Then the just principle which Britain and the United States want to uphold in this war, will be shattered into pieces by themselves (Only the Soviet Union upheld it alone.). Britain and the United States are hard pushed to reconcile what they propose and what they do. They are in difficulty.

The American navy and air force landed on Marshall Island. That place has been an important base for the Japanese army. (Its importance is tantamount to Japan Proper.) According to the American announcement, the amount of the capital ships used was more than all the capital ships the British navy had before the war. From this we can deduce the United States has, this time, used up a lot of strength. I am deeply relieved.