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[This Document is the Property of His Britannic Majesty's Government.]
AFFAIRS OF CHINA.
CONFIDENTIAL.
[23857]
No. 1.
C
27913
[July 4tc?
"REEB SEP 10
SECTION
(No. 196.) Sir,
Mr. Max Müller to Sir Edward Grey-(Received July 4.)
Peking, June 15, 1910. WITH reference to my despatch No. 176 of the 3rd June, I have the honour to transmit herewith a translation of a note from the Wai-wu Pu in reply to my note of the 3rd June, in which I warned them of the risks of armed collision if the Chinese authorities would not respect the frontier claimed by His Majesty's Government.
The Chinese reply is certainly not very conciliatory in tone, but that could hardly be expected. Moreover, it entirely misrepresents the tenour of my note, I therefore took the opportunity of a visit to the Wai-wn Pu yesterday to point out that it was misleading to state that I had ignored the Chinese request for a joint delimitation, as I had expressly stated that His Majesty's Government were awaiting the report of Mr. Consul Rose before replying to their note which contained that request; again, it was inaccurate to say that I had stated that "it was the intention of His Majesty's Government to instruct the Government of Burmah to occupy and administer the territory in question," as these words were a mere quotation from a note written by Sir Ernest Satow in 1906.
It is hardly necessary for me to draw attention to the curious confusion in the third paragraph of the note herein cnclosed, by which the N'Maikha River itself, which the Viceroy claims as the boundary, is stated to be identical with the watershed to the east of the N'Maikha.
I received yesterday your despatch No. 178 of the 26th May, and I notice in the letter addressed by the Foreign Office to the India Office on the 23rd May a statement to the effect that I had been consulted as to the feasibility of carrying out certain recommendations of the Government of India. I gather that this must refer to your telegram No. 72 of the 4th May, but I cannot see that that telegram, in the form in which it reached me, called for any expression of opinion on my part, and I beg therefore to state that my telegram No. 99 of the 21st ultimo was in no way meant as a reply to your telegram, as stated in the letter to the India Office, but merely suggested that I should, in view of the note just received from the Wai-wu Pu, warn the Chinese Government of the risks they were running in thus sending armed forces into territory claimed by His Majesty's Government pending a definite settlement of the question.
I presume that you have by this time received a copy of Mr. Rose's report. From that and from the notes of the Chinese Government, it has been made abundantly clear that the Chinose Government claim to exercise jurisdiction over villages on the British side of the frontier claimed by His Majesty's Government in 1906, and that they attach little weight to the threat made by Sir Ernest Satow in and that year, that the Government of Burmah would be instructed to occupy administer the country without further negotiations.
I see that in the India Office letter of the 11th May, Lord Morley suggested that I should be consulted as to the advisability of making immediate representations to the Chinese Government, urging the withdrawal of all Chinese officials and troops to the east side of the watershed. His Lordship added that there might be some advantage if I were authorised to intimate the possibility of an expedition on the lines recommended by the Government of Burmah.
I venture to express the opinion that such representations on my part, even if accompanied by the suggested intimation, would not, in the present state of mind of the Chinese, be likely to prove effectual, and that the best course for His Majesty's Government to adopt would be either to accept the Chinese request for a joint delimitation, or to send an expedition on the lines proposed, but without giving long warning to the Chinese Government, though it is needless for me to point out the dangers and risks involved in this second course, of the gravity and extent of which I am, moreover, hardly competent to judge.
[2827 d--b]
I have, &c.
W. G. MAX MÜLLER,