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Editorial Summary of Meetings with Yu Ta-wei, John Leighton Stuart,
and C. P. Lee
December 4–5, 1946 Nanking, China
Yu Ta-wei, December 4, 11:00 A.M.
Marshall said he was still awaiting a formal reply from Yenan to his
November 29 request for a statement on whether the Communist party wished
mediation to continue. They then discussed the leak to the local press of the
minutes Marshall had given General Yu of his November 16 meeting with Chou
En-lai.
Yu discussed events at the National Assembly meeting, particularly with
regard to the draft constitution. The government should adopt the P.C.C. draft
“without disrupting it by amendments and tricky phrases,” Marshall thought. If
subsequently the State Council were reorganized and reorganization of the
Executive Yuan begun, and if vacant seats were left on those bodies for the
Communists and the Democratic League, this would place the Communists “in a
rather difficult position” vis-à-vis public opinion. While this was being done,
Marshall suggested, the Generalissimo should send a representative privately to
Yenan to discuss ways the Communist party might come into the National
Assembly. Marshall hoped the Generalissimo would avoid making a public
statement about this, because “that would invite the usual Communist reaction of
distrust and suspicion.” Meanwhile, the government should cease aggressive
actions and not “resort to much abused ‘self-defensive’ measures” against
Communists. He was encouraged by an apparent relaxation of government
pressure on the independent press.
He “disagreed entirely,” Marshall told Yu, with Chiang Kai-shek’s belief
that: (1) now that the government had better roads and communications, it could
defeat the Communists in eight to ten months; (2) the agrarian population backed
the government and could continue to save China from economic collapse.
Recently, he noted, for the first time the Export-Import Bank had rejected loans
for two projects he had supported, because there was “not sufficient prospect of
amortization.” The problem, Marshall thought, resulted from the character of the
Nationalist government, the open corruption in it, and its militaristic policy.
(Foreign Relations, 1946, 10: 584–88.)
John Leighton Stuart, December 5, 10:00 A.M.
Marshall told the ambassador that he had just received a letter from Chou
En-lai saying that the Communists would resume negotiations only if the National
Assembly was dissolved and government troops returned to their positions as of
the January 13 cease-fire order. (See ibid., pp. 590–91.) Dr. Stuart
recommended that the United States support the National Government, provided
it ceased hostilities, reformed the Kuomintang, and reorganized. Since the
government always claimed to be fighting in self-defense, Marshall responded,
he doubted that the government could stop hostilities unilaterally. He also
doubted that the army could be much reduced, given the problem of guarding
long communications lines against an enemy the Generalissimo had vowed to
destroy.
Marshall recounted his various efforts to break the power of the
reactionaries in the National Government; he, unlike Stuart, thought it unlikely
that Chiang Kai-shek would break with the group. The previous evening,
Marshall recalled, he and his wife had dined with the Soviet ambassador, who
demonstrated considerable curiosity concerning Marshall’s assessment of the
current situation in China. Marshall was critical of Kuomintang reactionary
elements and how the Communists had played into their hands through their
suspicions and refusal to negotiate. Marshall expected the ambassador to report
the conversation to the Chinese Communists.
Chou En-lai’s letter, in Marshall’s view, “was tantamount to Communist
acceptance of the Generalissimo’s challenge to settle the issue by force.” Dr.
Stuart believed that the United States should continue its present policy toward
China in the hope that the government would be reformed. Stuart also thought
that such strengthening of the National Government would surprise and give
pause to the Communists. Marshall thought there were practical and political
difficulties to announcing a new U.S. government policy and getting the public to
accept it. (Ibid., pp. 591–94.)
C. P. Lee, December 5, 11:00 A.M.
General Lee told Marshall that the U.S. government’s (i.e., Marshall’s)
policy of not rendering financial assistance to a China engaged in civil war would
have a beneficial effect on the situation. “General Marshall retorted that he could
not see what was good about it, since actually the Chinese people would suffer
from it instead of the rival political parties.” Lee was reluctant to give up hope for
continued negotiations even after Marshall outlined Chou En-lai’s response to the
November 29 request. The Communist party had done practically what the CC
clique and the militarists in the Kuomintang had wanted them to do since April,
Marshall concluded; consequently, it “had practically defeated” his mission. (Ibid.,
pp. 594–95.)
Recommended Citation: The Papers of George Catlett Marshall, ed. Larry I. Bland and Sharon
Ritenour Stevens (Lexington, Va.: The George C. Marshall Foundation, 1981– ). Electronic
version based on The Papers of George Catlett Marshall, vol. 5, “The Finest Soldier,” January 1,
1945–January 7, 1947 (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003), pp.
752–753.