The Cambridge History of China. Vol. 13: Republican China 1912-1949, Part 2

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POWER CONFIGURATIONS, I937—I94I }2I

Kai-shek's pledge not to use them against the Soviets. (This was the tenor

of the non-aggression pact the two countries signed

August 1937.) But

this

was to be

part

of a

more general system

of aid to

China. Russian

diplomats were eager

work through the League

Nations, which

the

Soviet Union

had

joined

in 1934, and to

approach

the

United States,

Britain

and

others

for

joint sanction against Japan.

The

Soviets were

eager

for a

meeting

the Washington Conference signatories,

and

they

sent

representative

to the

Brussels Conference, convened

November

1937.

This

was the

first time that Russia participated

in an

international

conference dealing with

the Far

East.

The Brussels Conference, though

it did not

produce

the

international

resolve

and

commitment

the

Soviets

had

hoped

for,

clearly marked

the

point where Russia, together with America

and

Britain, sought

isolate

Japan

and

bolster China

much

possible

'reinforce international

security',

journal de Moscou

put it.

Brussels' meagre results

—

the

delegates merely reiterated the powers' interest in a settlement compatible

with

the

nine-power treaty

1922,

and no

sanctions against Japan were

adopted

did

not

obscure

the

fact that

clearly internationalized

the

Sino-Japanese

War, and was

thus

line with President Roosevelt's

quarantine speech

October

1937, in

which

he had

called upon

all

peace-loving nations

isolate aggressive forces

the world. By the end

of 1937,

was clear that Japan's international position was eroding,

and

China's being enhanced

inverse proportion.

The only setback

for

China, and Japan's principal gain, was Germany's

decision

recognize Manchukuo. By the end

1937 Hitler had decided

to annex Austria

and

Czechoslovakia

so as to

create

enlarged

and

economically more viable empire, and prepare

for

the ultimate ' holy war'

against the Soviet Union. But

was necessary

neutralize Great Britain

in Asia by an entente with Japan, just as the Berlin-Rome Axis would check

Britain

Europe. Japan's cooperation must

bought

Germany's

withdrawing military advisers from China

and

recognizing Manchukuo.

Hitler

was

willing

take these drastic steps because

anticipated

showdown with Britain,

and

because

he was led to

believe,

by his

pro-Japanese aides, that China was destined

lose the war. This gamble

would cost Germany dearly.

the

beginning

1938,

the

Chinese could feel much less isolated.

The Brussels Conference had

least shown that most countries interested

the Far

East were united

sympathy

for

China.

The

Soviet Union

was delivering hundreds

planes and guns. Russian pilots were arriving

Nathan Haslam, 'Soviet aid

China and Japan's place

Moscow's foreign policy, 1937-1939',

Ian

Nish,

ed.

Some aspects

Soviet-Japanese

relations

the ipjos, 39-40.

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522 CHINA'S INTERNATIONAL POSITION

in Chungking. More important, the United States and Britain were

showing signs, cautious to be sure, of working together in Asian

matters - as when Captain Royal E. Ingersoll of the United States navy

went to London in January 1938 to exchange information on joint strategy

toward Japan.

Chungking now had the undoubted support of America,

Britain and Russia. The Sino-Japanese War fitted into their global policies

to a far greater extent than before. Whereas the Manchurian crisis had

mobilized the powers to preserve the existing framework of international

relations, which they were forced to abandon, this time the Western

powers were determined to oppose Japan's and possibly Germany's

attempt to redefine the structure of world affairs. China would play a major

role in new conceptions that were being developed for organizing a global

alliance against Germany and Japan. The emerging alliance had two

components. One was a carryover from the earlier anti-fascist popular

front promulgated by Russia. The other was a scheme for Anglo-American

cooperation, resurrected after years of neglect. Both were designed to

restrain the fascist nations, particularly Japan, but they had different

connotations. The popular front was broader in scope, the Anglo-

American arrangement was more narrow. Ideologically, the former

retained left-wing connotations, although much diluted, whereas the latter

was oriented toward liberal democratic principles. It was not clear whether

two such contrasting alignments could in fact be combined to form an

effective power bloc. But in any case China could be fitted into both of

them quite nicely. China qualified as anti-fascist, while at the same time

it could be received into the Anglo-American democratic coalition as an

honorary member, so to speak. In the Asian context, at least, China united

under Chiang Kai-shek appeared as democratic as could be expected in

wartime. While few claimed then that China was fighting for democracy,

it was entirely clear that its people were refusing to submit to fascist

invaders who were committing acts of pillage and carnage like the ' rape

of Nanking'. The heroic resistance of the Chinese drew American and

British admiration throughout 1938.

Unfortunately for China, the nascent global coalition against Japan

underwent additional changes in 1938 and 1939 because of developments

in Europe. For most of those two years, the popular front and the

Anglo-American coalition were joined by a third scheme designed to

stabilize international, in particular European affairs. This was the appease-

ment strategy, an alternative to the Soviet-initiated popular front and to

the exclusively democratic combination of the United States and Britain,

Peter Lowe, Great Britain and

tie

origins

tie

Pacific war:

study

British

policy

East Asia,

'9J9-W,

34-5-

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POWER CONFIGURATIONS, I937-I94I 523

although in fact all three were pursued simultaneously. To put it in

perspective, appeasement was an effort to return to some sort of

internationalism, political as well as economic, to prevent the world from

becoming hopelessly divided. Even though it was well recognized that

the post-1919 internationalist framework could not be resurrected in toto,

it appeared possible to the exponents of this scheme at least to strive for

an end to the economic and political division of the 1930s world and

re-establish machinery for global interdependence. Just as economic forces

had been the basis for the 1920s internationalism, so were they viewed

as the key to the new attempt. The roots of the international tensions

appeared to be economic, so that if stability were to return to the world

stage it would be necessary to recreate conditions favourable for the

industrialization, trade and economic growth of all countries, including

even Germany, Japan and Italy. Here was the major difference between

appeasement and the other alternatives. Appeasement would not mean

much unless all principal countries joined together for economic reinte-

gration. The fascist powers would have to be brought into the scheme;

in fact, this was the justification for the diplomacy of appeasement. It

assumed, of course, that the Germans, Japanese and Italians shared the

same concern over the economic roots of conflict and an interest in

working with other countries for a better international order.

Such an idea had been there in the early 1930s, but had not been

vigorously pursued; the Western countries, too, had adopted nationalistic

economic policies. Now, for the first time in the decade, an opportunity

seemed ripe for one more effort. In most countries industrial output had

regained the level of 1929, yet world trade was still less than half

its

value

before the depression. If peace were to be securely founded, it seemed

vital to push for an open world market to encourage trade and investment.

If Germany and Japan could be persuaded to concentrate on those

activities, rather than militaristic aggrandizement, then they too could be

part of the new arrangement. The advocates of appeasement saw it as a

far preferable alternative to the popular front or the Anglo-American

coalition, both of which could be divisive rather than reintegrationist,

since both had the potential of turning into a global military alliance

against the fascist nations, and the appeasement alternative was a way of

avoiding such confrontations. It gave priority to reintegrating the

advanced nations of Germany, Italy and Japan over cooperating with

Russia or China.

The Chinese, for that reason, were disheartened by the appeasement

diplomacy pursued by the United States and Britain throughout 1938. To

be sure, the diplomacy primarily concerned Europe, not Asia. The British

Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008

CHINA S INTERNATIONAL POSITION

government, uncertain of the wisdom of too close a link to America and

still confident of working with Hitler, sought to appease him over

Czechoslovakia in the Munich agreement of September. The United States

hailed it as an important accomplishment that would help re-establish

internationalism. Asia was not directly involved, and neither Britain nor

America wanted to apply a similar strategy to Japan, which was far more

explicitly aggressive than Germany. Lord Halifax, who master-minded

the Munich appeasement together with Prime Minister Neville

Chamberlain, commented in May, ' China is fighting the battle of all the

law-abiding States and she is incidentally fighting our own battle in the

Far East, for if Japan wins, our interests there are certainly doomed to

extinction.'

This was no language of appeasement toward Japan.

Though the British were wary of war with Japan, they were far more

willing to aid China than Czechoslovakia. The Americans, likewise, while

applauding Munich, left no doubt as to their preferred course in Asia.

Negotiations were begun in the autumn of 1938 for a loan of US

$25 million to China, a modest amount but the first formal American

commitment. Shortly before the loan announcement, when the Japanese

government issued its 'new order in Asia' statement, both Washington

and London quickly denounced it. Although they did not act jointly,

Britain made sure that its position would approximate America's, and that

the Japanese would know this.

The Soviet Union, while cautious toward

Japan, was increasingly confident of its position in the Far East, due in

part to the continued resistance by the Chinese, and also to the reports

by Richard Sorge's spy ring in Tokyo that Japan was not prepared to

fight Russia.

The Soviet leadership was aware that in giving China the

most substantial outside help at this time it did not risk isolation, and

that there was a good chance of the Anglo-American powers stepping

up international pressures on Japan, of which Soviet power would form

a part.

If these were encouraging signs from the Chinese point of

view,

British

and American appeasement in Europe could not but affect Asia. This

became evident when Stalin, seeing Munich as evidence of the capitalist

countries' willingness to patch up their differences with the Nazis, moved

during the spring and summer of 1939 steadily away from the popular

front and cooperation with the Anglo-Americans to an accommodation

with Germany. This was only a temporary expedient in response to the

apparent eagerness of the Western governments to reintegrate Germany

and Italy while once again isolating Russia from the world community.

Although such fears were exaggerated, appeasement and the popular front

Ibid.

41-2. «

Ibid.

50-5. so Haslam, 48-9.

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POWER CONFIGURATIONS, I937-194I 5

were incompatible. When Stalin entered into a non-aggression pact with

Hitler in August 1939, the implications were obvious; the popular front

was dead, and the world's anti-fascist forces - individuals and groups -

were thoroughly dismayed. What was going to replace it? Appeasement,

too,

had to be a casualty, for an agreement between Germany and Russia

was certainly not what the British, French and American governments

had envisaged when they promoted reintegrationism. The Anti-Comintern

Pact, too, was dealt a blow; a fascist coalition against the Soviet

Communist state made no sense when a member of it was openly

consorting with Russia.

For China these were appalling developments. The Nazi-Soviet

rapprochement destroyed hope of cooperation among Britain, America

and Russia in world affairs. Moreover, with Germany openly defying the

Munich agreement by absorbing Czechoslovakia and intent upon attacking

Poland next, Britain and the United States were likely to be preoccupied

with Europe, yet the United States was still far more reluctant than the

European countries to resist Germany by force. The only glimmer of hope

for the Chinese was the fact that the Nazi-Soviet pact enabled the Soviet

Union to transfer a large number of troops to the Far East; the

Nomonhan incident, involving skirmishes between Russian and Japanese

forces along the Manchurian-Mongolian border in the summer of 1939,

demonstrated the superiority of Russian fire-power.

By the time the Second World War broke out in September 1939,

therefore, the promising beginnings of cooperation among Britain, the

United States, the Soviet Union and China had been replaced by a more

fluid situation. With German-Japanese relations strained, there was even

a chance that Tokyo might also reorient its policy, especially in view of

the abrogation of the treaty of commerce with the United States, which

Washington had announced in July as a unilateral act to put pressure on

Japan. It had the desired effect of shocking Tokyo's officials into

scrambling for ways to ameliorate Japanese-American relations. In the

autumn and winter of

1939,

during the European 'phony war', Japan and

the United States carried on talks to see if they could agree upon a common

definition of the status quo. If successful, they might have built a new

stability on the de facto presence of Japanese power in China. The Chinese

would have been the more discouraged, if they had known that some in

London, notably Parliamentary Under-Secretary R. A. Butler, were

talking vaguely about resurrecting the Anglo-Japanese alliance as a way

of containing the Far Eastern crisis.

Yet a Far Eastern appeasement, which would have been a devastating

Lowe, Pacifit war, 106.

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526

CHINA'S

INTERNATIONAL

POSITION

blow to Free China, was not to be. Both Britain and America would have

been interested in reintegrating Japan into a cooperative scheme, but not

on the terms the Japanese insisted upon. Despite its overtures to

Washington and London at the time for improving their relations, Tokyo

could not give up its commitments in China, for it could not restrain its

military. Even while the government sought to improve relations with

London and Washington, it had to proclaim the establishment of

puppet

regime in Nanking under Wang Ching-wei, an act certainly calculated to

frustrate any negotiations with the West. As a British diplomat wrote,

' Let us see how much genuine Chinese support her new regime in China

can command before we take an attitude towards it. And above all let

us see how Japan is going to satisfy the United States Government in

the forthcoming struggle about the commercial treaty, without allowing

a wedge to be driven between ourselves and the Americans.'

As can be seen in such a quote, the European war tied Britain and the

United States together. An Anglo-American partnership re-emerged, now

shorn of connotations of Soviet participation, or of the appeasement of

the fascist states. It would be a genuine bilateral alliance for the

preservation of democracy. (President Roosevelt would term his country

the arsenal of democracy.) Power and ideals were firmly joined; as

Reinhold Niebuhr wrote in his

Christianity

and power

politics,

the cherished

civilization of the democracies could not be saved without power, for to

do nothing would merely encourage further aggression. Peace was no

longer a viable alternative, certainly not a peace of inaction, under-

armament, and appeasement of fascist states. Thus international affairs in

1940 saw the clear emergence of the Anglo-American alliance upon the

demise of the popular front and appeasement. All that remained was to

globalize it, to have it applied in Asia as well as Europe.

This was accomplished when the European and the East Asian wars

merged as a result of the German spring offensive of 1940 in France.

Almost instantaneously, it rekindled the Japanese leaders' interest in a

German alliance. Germany's victories in Europe offered Japan a unique

opportunity to seize areas south of China, cutting off outside help to

Chungking while obtaining the region's rich resources. For Berlin, a

Japanese alliance would immobilize the United States in Asia and prevent

its intervention in Europe. Such logic inevitably produced the Axis

alliance of September 1940. It also brought the two wars into proximity.

To be sure, Anglo-American concentration on defending Britain could

mean a lower priority for Asia, but they would never sacrifice China in

order to appease Japan, now that appeasement of Germany had been given

Ibid. 124.

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POWER CONFIGURATIONS, 1937-1941 527

up,

and Japan and Germany were closely linked. All this enhanced the

importance of China once again, as before 1938. This time, of course, the

Soviet Union was not part of the pro-China coalition. Indeed, toward

the end of 1940, as it became clear that Hitler would repudiate the

non-aggression pact and turn on him, Stalin sought to mend fences with

Japan so as to avoid a two-front war. Slowly but unmistakably, the Soviet

Union and Japan effected a rapprochement, signing their neutrality pact

in April 1941. The Soviet Union now definitely abandoned the popular

front in Asia as well as in Europe. Meanwhile the increasing American

and British support of China was being reinforced by the Dutch in the

East Indies. Although the Netherlands had fallen to the Nazis, the Dutch

colonial regime maintained its semi-independent existence and stubbornly

resisted the Japanese efforts to procure petroleum. Dutch officials

consulted closely their American and British counterparts, and the three

devised a joint approach to Japan. This created the so-called ABCD

group - America, Britain, China and the Dutch East Indies - which, while

by no means a well-defined entity, at least provided for joint action and

put immense psychological pressure on the Japanese. For their dreaded

isolation in Asia was becoming a reality, which their ties to Germany and

Italy did little to counter. The Axis alliance could not help Japan cope

with the 'ABCD encirclement'.

Thus China found itself once again a part of the globalized Anglo-

American alliance to prevent the Axis domination of the world. China's

position now seemed far more secure, its destiny bound up with that of

America and Britain. The United States brought China into its global

strategy specifically by providing aviation experts, 'volunteer' pilots and

aircraft, organized as the Flying Tigers, to fight the Japanese air force

in China. When Congress enacted the Lend-Lease bill, Washington

immediately applied the programme of aid to China as well as to Britain.

London stiffened its policy toward Japan, confident of American support.

While the Anglo-American strategic talks (the so-called 'ABC sessions)

in the winter of

1940—1

reaffirmed the primacy of the European theatre,

the participants also agreed to coordinate strategic action in the Pacific.

Above all, as the American and British leaders pledged to preserve

democracy in the world, China, too, became part of their fight for

democracy. In other words, by becoming part of the global struggle for

power, China could be assured of ultimate deliverance from Japan. No

wonder, then, that the Japanese-American negotiations that took place

in Washington intermittently throughout 1941 reached no conclusion.

The talks reflected Japanese desperation and a tactic to divide America

from China by asking Washington to press Chungking to settle the war.

Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008

528 CHINA'S INTERNATIONAL POSITION

But American officials, though they agreed to continue the talks, primarily

to gain time for military preparation, had no thought of accepting Japanese

control over China.

China's international position was further strengthened when, on 22

June

1941,

Hitler's army attacked Stalin's. The Nazi invasion added Russia

to the Anglo-American-Chinese coalition. The German-Russian war

meant a reprieve for Britain on the western front, while forcing the Soviet

Union to shift its forces away from Asia to defend European Russia. When

Japan decided not to attack Russia from the rear, but instead remain

neutral, the Chinese realized they could get much less help from the

Russians than before. Yet Soviet re-entry into the war resurrected the

popular front and merged it into the Anglo-American alliance. China

would now be part of this comprehensive alliance, and of the victory that

was expected to be the allies' sooner or later. As the London Times

correspondent reported from Chungking, in the Chinese view 'the

German attack on Russia has at last aligned the free peoples of the world,

led by the ABC front, against the forces of aggression'. In contrast, Japan's

position was expected to become 'more hazardous, beset by economic

difficulties, uncertain of her friends, and tempted by moves which might

easily bring her into open conflict with Russia, Britain, the Indies, and

possibly the United States, when she has over

1,000,000

troops tied up

in China'.

Such thinking reflected confidence that China had at last

succeeded in isolating Japan, while itself becoming one of the key powers

in the world.

The ideology of the global war became more clear after the German

assault on the Soviet Union. The Anglo-American allies and the Soviet

Communists were now all together in a common task of defeating the

Axis.

The popular front and the democratic alliance were fused. An

American writer termed the new alliance a 'world democratic front', an

apt phrase combining the two earlier conceptions.

No longer would

American democracy be sufficient unto

itself;

it would become part of

a global movement for freedom. This new internationalism was best

expressed in the joint declaration by Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston

Churchill at the end of their meeting in the Atlantic in August 1941, the

Atlantic Charter. The two leaders pledged not merely to coordinate their

countries' military resources and strategies, but also to cooperate to bring

about a more secure and just international order. The charter enumerated

principles such as self-determination, economic interdependence, inter-

national cooperation, collective security and arms reduction.

subscribing

10904/280/10,

in FO

371/27670, Foreign Office Archives, Public Record Office (London).

New

Republic,

105.8 (25 Aug. 1941) 238.

POWER CONFIGURATIONS, I937-I94I 529

to them, China would join the Anglo-American democracies and make

the war against Japan part

the global struggle

for

democracy.

The

Japanese,

contrast, felt themselves ostracized. As Asahi commented,

the Atlantic Charter signified America's readiness to enter the war on the

side

Britain

and

Russia,

and

also revealed

effort

appeal

Europeans and Asians alike

join the United States and Britain

the

name

the new principles and to isolate Germany, Italy and Japan.

Japan was clearly

put on the

defensive, forced either

effect some

rapprochement with the Anglo-American powers

detach them from

China,

or to

give up all such attempts and consolidate its Asian empire.

In fact Tokyo pursued both these courses simultaneously.

On the

one

hand, the talks in Washington were resumed after the Atlantic Conference.

Even when Prime Minister Konoe was replaced by General Tojo Hideki,

representing

the

army's belligerent stance,

was considered wise

continue the talks to see

the United States would be willing to resume

trade with Japan, lessen its commitment to China, and avoid a showdown

the

Pacific.

Any

such agreement would,

course,

be a

blow

China's leaders, who were extremely sensitive about

the

Washington

conversations. London, too,

did not

want

the

United States

make

concessions

Japan

at the

expense

China; they would merely

embolden Japan and reduce the likelihood of American military involve-

ment

the Pacific. Thus during September

December 1941 Chinese

and British officials kept

close contact with one another, anxiously

awaiting the outcome of

the

Washington talks. As the British ambassador

reported from Chungking, there was 'widespread and growing anxiety

lest [the] United States Government, with ourselves following them, mean

to sell out the Chinese'. The British sought

reassure the Chinese that

it was inconceivable

that the United States should have any idea of selling

China down the river'. All of them 'were fighting the same war, whether

in Europe

the Pacific'.

The idea that there was

global democratic

alliance and that China should never be sacrificed in the short-term interest

of preserving peace with an aggressive Japan was one that both Chiang

Kai-shek and Churchill communicated

Roosevelt

late November,

when they got wind of a modus vivendi being worked out in Washington.

The president accepted their argument and,

for

this and other reasons,

rejected the modus vivendi proposal. He could not have done otherwise.

The only agreement with Japan that would have been acceptable

Chungking and London would have been along the lines of the Hull note

of 26 November, calling on the Japanese army to evacuate China as well

Asabi, 16 Aug. (evening), 1941.

8496/60/10 and F 9109/60/10, in FO 571/27615, Foreign Office Archives.

530 CHINA

INTERNATIONAL POSITION

as Indo-China

and

advising

the

Japanese nation

to go

back

to the

internationalism

of the

1920s.

other words, they must join

the

democracies,

else remain ostracized.

The Japanese were coming

to the

same conclusion. Unless they made

drastic concessions

to the

United States,

and

therefore

China, they

would have

face

the

continued

and

solid opposition

of the

Western

powers

and be

prepared

defend what they

had

even

at the

risk

war.

That

was the

reasoning behind

the war

plans they worked

out in the

autumn

1941 even

they talked

Washington.

On the

assumption

that

the

Washington negotiations would lead nowhere, Japan's military

and civilian leaders decided

face

the

possibility

war with America

and Britain,

addition

China,

in the

near future.

The

most effective

way

conducting such warfare would

be to

establish

impregnable

Asian empire with access

the rich resources

South-East Asia.

At the

same time, Japan's armed forces would strike

the American and British

fleets, to purge

the

region

potential threats

to the

empire.

The

plans

made

early September signalled Japan's resolve

take

on the

major

powers

of the

world. Japan would defend

its

isolated position

establishing Asian hegemony.

At that late hour,

war

could have been avoided only

by the

Japanese

agreeing

to the

terms offered

by the

United States, specifically

endorsing

the

Atlantic Charter,

the

Hull note,

and