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DRAFT TELEGRAM
68
PRIME MINISTER to PRESIDENT TRUMAN
PERSONAL AND TOP SECRET
Thank you for your Personal and Top Secret telegram No.4 containing General Order No. 1 to General of the Army MacArthur, which you have approved with the understand ing that it is subject to change both by further instructions issued through the Joint Chiefs of Staff and in matters of detail by the Supreme Commander for the Allied Forces in the light of the operational situation as known by him.
2. I am in general agreement with your order which is now being examined in detal. Meanwhile I have the following comments.
Hong Kong
3.
I think that the provisions of paragraphs 1A and 1F may lead to some confusion. The British colony of Hong Kong, comprising the Island of Hong Kong, Kowloon Port and the New Territories, may be regarded as being within China by the Japanese Commanders on the spot. As has already been notified to the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Chinese Government, a British naval force is now on its way to release hong kong from Japanese occupation, to bring aid to prisoners and internees situated in the colony, and to restore the British administration. I request you to instruct the Allied Supreme Commander, General of the Army MacArthur, to order the Japanese High Command to ensure that the Japanese local commanders in the colony of Hong Kong shall surrender to the Commander of the British Naval Force on his arrival.
French Indo-China
4. Paragraph 10 of your Order still recognises a boundary which has been rendered obsolete by events. French Indo-China is French territory, and I think it important that the Supreme Allied Commander, South-Zast Asia, to whose command the French Government have entrusted their forces, should take the surrender of the Japanese forces in the whole of French Indo-China, using French forces as far as possible. Our common object
would thereafter be to restore the French administration of Indo-China and to introduce French forces and administration for this purpose as soon as they are available in sufficient numbers.
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