Wednesday, 30 August

Fine

In the afternoon I went to the airport to meet General Hurley and others.  Harriman came with me. The plane arrived at 6.00 p.m. The people who came with him included Lieutenant General Patrick Hurley, Donald Nelson, Col. McNally, Edward Locke, James A. Jacobsan, Sergeant Smith, Pilot Major Fred Kelly, and a military crew of 8. Military Attaché Zhu Shiming was also with them. I expressed to them that I represented my government in welcoming Hurley and Nelson, and introduced them to Counsellor Liu and Military Attaché Guo, Secretaries Chen and Xie and Vice Military Attaché Zhou. They expressed their thanks. Ambassador Harriman told them that I invited them for luncheon the day after tomorrow, and said that he would accompany them to visit me at the Embassy at 11.00 a.m. tomorrow. He also told them that I had been very helpful to him and he was respectful of my opinion and observation. He also praised me highly. I said I was flattered. The Soviet Government also dispatched its director of communications and the representative of the war office to welcome them.

In the evening Military Attaché Zhu Shiming came and talked to me. He said as follows: 1) During the last six months, the American people have been very critical towards China, for three reasons. A) Because of the Burmese war. As a matter of fact, the opening of the Burmese battlefield was Stillwell’s idea and the American Chief-of-Staff agreed to it. The British side at first was strongly opposed to this, especially General Wavell. It was only after a conference with the Americans and after the conference in Casablanca, that Britain agreed. The transfer of Wavell to India as Governor and the transfer of Mountbatten to Burma were all because of this. The implementation of plans was decided at the Cairo Conference. Britain would transfer three divisions and a portion of its navy to land at Rangoon first. At the time Britain would extract troops from Italy, on their way to the Far East, but suddenly they were transferred to attack the Dodecanese Island and did not come to the Far East at all. Stilwell was very angry with Britain for this, and without having British agreement, he sent three divisions of the Chinese army trained by himself to Burma to fight alone. Though this move was agreed by the Generalissimo later, Britain and the United States were extremely displeased that China did not keep to its word and repeatedly sent telegrams to Churchill. But still they got no satisfactory reply. B) The issue of the foreign exchange rate of the American army in China. Because the American army in China used over 20 million dollars, the American side asked us to raise the exchange rate to 80 Fabi. But we only agreed for 40. The black market rate is well over 200, and the American side supposed that we were being unfair. C) American reporters and the Americans in China always had bad words about China. American Ambassador Clarence E. Gauss also did not cooperate with the Foreign Ministry. Because of these three reasons, American newspapers have attacked us, and even American authority has clearly shown that it is disappointed with us. For instance, in a recent press conference, the American Chief-of-Staff said that many things on the Chinese side were disappointing. Though the United States wanted to help China in many ways, they were unable to prop us up. As to our military, the United States was particularly disappointed. They reckoned that to defeat Japan in the future they could not depend upon the Chinese army. For the original plan of training 900,000 modern elitist Chinese soldiers, Americans started to be suspicious whether it was possible or not. Because according to recent war experience in Burma, the Chinese military were absolutely not competent enough. Stilwell had mentioned this to the Generalissimo, and Marshall told Military Attaché Zhu many times. Because of these things, President Roosevelt was very worried about China and cabled the Generalissimo to offer advice. The Generalissimo replied that he was grateful and asked him to send someone who could represent President Roosevelt to China to negotiate. Therefore, Roosevelt sent these two people. The reason the Generalissimo made this proposal was because when Vice-President Wallace returned to America from China he criticised China on many aspects. 2) Zhu also said that with regard to the representatives we sent to America to take part in the conference about world peace organisation after the war, some said that China was still a little and weak country, it should join other smaller countries to counter stronger states. It is really a great pity. 3) With regard to the negotiations in the United States, Vice President H.H Kung was directly in touch with Roosevelt. As for military matters, Military Attaché Zhu would discuss with Chief-of-Staff Marshall, and would absolutely not go through the Chinese Embassy. Therefore this time these two people went to China and Wei Daoming knew nothing about it. 4) Financial Conference. Kung was on good terms with the American Finance Minister. Although there were some differences between the Americans and the Soviets, the results were very good. 5) Liu Kai first got on badly with Wei Daoming, but it turned out better recently. When Kung went to the United States, Liu Kai was immediately sent to help him. He asked me about the Sino-Soviet relationship. I told him something about it and asked him to report to the Generalissimo. Also with regard to the Xinjiang Incident, it should be resolved urgently.