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Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports 2003 In Support of “New China”: Origins of the China Lobby, 1937-1941 Tae Jin Park Follow this and additional works at: https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/etd Part of the Asian History Commons Recommended Citation Park, Tae Jin, "In Support of “New China”: Origins of the China Lobby, 1937-1941" (2003). Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports. 7369. https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/etd/7369 This Dissertation is protected by copyright and/or related rights. It has been brought to you by the The Research Repository @ WVU with permission from the rights-holder(s). You are free to use this Dissertation in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you must obtain permission from the rights-holder(s) directly, unless additional rights are indicated by a Creative Commons license in the record and/ or on the work itself. This Dissertation has been accepted for inclusion in WVU Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports collection by an authorized administrator of The Research Repository @ WVU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. In Support of “New China”: Origins of the China Lobby, 1937-1941. Tae Jin Park Dissertation submitted to the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences at West Virginia University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History Jack L. Hammersmith, Ph.D., Chair Elizabeth A. Fones-Wolf, Ph.D. A. Michal McMahon, Ph.D. Jason C. Parker, Ph.D. Hong N. Kim, Ph.D. Department of History Morgantown, West Virginia 2003 Keywords: China Lobby, T. V. Soong, Henry Morgenthau Copyright 2003 Tae Jin Park ABSTRACT In Support of “New China”: Origins of the China Lobby, 1937-1941. Tae Jin Park The “China Lobby,” a common term applied to groups and individuals aggressively seeking America’s political commitments to and financial aid for Chiang Kai-shek’s Guomindang (GMD) regime in China, came into popular use in the 1950's, especially as it fit into the highly volatile context of the Cold War. A closer investigation of this lobby, however, reveals that it originated not in the postwar turmoil of Cold War politics but a decade earlier in the equally difficult debate over the proper role of the United States during the “China Incident” of the late 1930's. Pro-Chinese lobbying and propaganda activities in America began in the 1930's as efforts to persuade Washington to render its long-term commitment to China, then a semi-colony struggling against the Japanese empire. Yet, the U.S. State Department maintained a policy that discouraged America’s long-term political commitment or substantial financial aid to China. What cannot be overlooked was the Roosevelt administration’s diverse and often secretive way of conducting foreign policy. It preferred to deal with China behind the scenes, given the prominent isolationist sentiments and anxieties Americans held on U.S.-Japanese relations. Thus, although the State Department was unwilling to approve official aid to China, negotiations over U.S. aid to China were conducted largely through “non-regular” channels of diplomacy until 1941. These ad hoc channels of diplomacy took hold during the “China Incident” of 1937-1941 when Washington found it difficult to support China openly against Japan and yet agreed to finance China’s war against Japan through subsidiary agencies of the Treasury Department and the Reconstruction Finance Corporation. At the same time, Washington allowed private American aid to flow to China on humanitarian grounds. This private support was accompanied by unofficial propaganda efforts that characterized China’s cause in terms of the struggle for a “New China.” Accordingly, lobbyists or publicists rather than the diplomats themselves played a major role in promoting Sino-American relations during that period. Yet, apart from the original intentions of the Roosevelt administration, these policies contributed directly to the formation of the China Lobby in America by 1941. In other words, the China Lobby grew as an offshoot of Roosevelt’s secret and often unconventional diplomacy that sought to keep China fighting Japan by supporting such low-risk measures as financial trade and propaganda rather than through open diplomatic commitment or political alliance. Tracing the influences on the U.S. government by individuals and organizations that in fact, if not in name, comprised a “China Lobby” in the prewar years, this study seeks to reveal that it was at least as powerful as the later one but, due to a Cold War emphasis on the “loss” of China in 1949, was never as well understood. Table of Contents Introduction: On the Origins of the China Lobby. -------------------------------------------------- 1 Chapter I. The “Salvation” of China and the “Fateful Enemy” of America: American Perceptions of China and Japan to 1937. ------------------------------- 13 Chapter II. Diplomacy and “Monetary Concerns” about China: Sino-American Financial Connections, 1928-1937. ------------------------------- 51 Chapter III. American “Responsibility” for China’s Distress: Pro-Chinese Publicity in America, 1937-1940. ------------------------------------ 98 Chapter IV. Morgenthau and the K. P. Chen Mission: Sino-American Financial Transactions, 1937-1940. ------------------------------ 157 Chapter V. From the Soong Mission to the Currie Mission: T. V. Soong and Sino-American Relations, 1940-1941. ------------------------- 220 Chapter VI. American Commitments to a “New China”: Lend-Lease Aid and Publicity Campaigns, 1941. --------------------------------- 263 Conclusions: A Useful Instrument of Diplomacy. ------------------------------------------------- 322 Bibliography -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 337 iii A Note on Chinese Names This dissertation uses the old Wade-Giles system to romanize the names of Chinese persons. The current Pinyin version may confuse the identities of persons in this study because their names, in either full or abbreviated form, in most English sources that this dissertation deals with had been recorded under the Wade-Giles system. For instance, Zi Wen Song is a Pinyin version of Tzu Ven Soong (Wade-Giles version), a figure commonly known as T. V. Soong in most English publications of his period. To avoid this kind of unnecessary confusion, this dissertation uses the Wade-Giles version to refer to personal names, because it was the common rendition at the time. However, the Pinyin system is used for other Chinese terms and locations, since they are clearly identifiable, with some exceptions for such familiar names as Canton (Guangzhou). iv List of Abbreviated Names of Organizations AAC: Aeronautical Affairs Commission ABMAC: American Bureau for Medical Aid to China AVG: American Volunteer Group (in China) CCP: Chinese Communist Party CDFC: China Development Finance Corporation CDS: China Defense Supplies, Inc. CIC: Chinese Industrial Cooperatives CIS: China Information Service, Inc. CAMCO: Central Aircraft Manufacturing Corporation CNS: Chinese News Service, Inc. ECO: Export Control Office EIB: Export-Import-Bank GMD: Guomindang (Nationalist Party) NCC: National Christian Council of China NDAC: National Defense Advisory Commission Price Committee: American Committee for Non-Participation in Japanese Aggression RFC: Reconstruction Finance Corporation TPNS: Trans-Pacific News Service, Inc. UCC: United Council for Civilian Relief in China UCR: United China Relief, Inc. (United Service to China) UTC: Universal Trading Company v Introduction: On the Origins of the “China Lobby.” In August 1949, when much of China had fallen in the hands of the Chinese Communists, the U.S. Department of State released the “China White Paper” in an effort to justify its policy of disengagement from the beleaguered Guomindang (GMD) Government of Chiang Kai-shek. By emphasizing the fact that America was not responsible for the fall of the GMD regime, the State Department sought to mollify opponents of its China policy or at least to justify that policy to Americans in general. However, in the years to follow, the “China Lobby,” a coalition of pro- Chiang forces affiliated with the Republican Party, bitterly charged that the State Department had “betrayed” Chiang, America’s wartime ally, and launched campaigns to identify those allegedly responsible for the “loss” of China to the Communists.1 This “loss” of China debate, magnified by McCarthyism during the Korean War and the Cold War stand-off with the People’s Republic of China, in turn inspired journalistic and scholarly attempts to investigate the influence of this potent lobby in America. The “China Lobby,” a common term applied to groups and individuals aggressively seeking America’s political commitments to and financial aid for Chiang’s regime, had come into popular use in the 1950's. Lacking coherent unity, the Lobby was represented by various people who had differing motives and varying degrees of interest in China. Famous members of the China Lobby included publisher Henry R. Luce, Congressman Walter H. Judd, Senator William F. Knowland, diplomat William C. Bullitt, aviator Claire L. Chennault, businessman Alfred Kohlberg, and lawyer William J. Goodwin. One of the focal points for much of writing about this lobby focused on its role in the “loss” of China debate, especially as it fit into the 1 highly volatile context of the Cold War. A closer investigation