50. M.A.
M. A. Shine to A. M.S.S.O. Yel w1686
20.645
51. M.A. bhim to H.11.8.50 - Yel 1687-26845
Sir G. Gat
Gater.
I mentioned to you this morning the matter of the Chiefs of Staff Directive to Admiral Harcourt on the military side of his functions. (C.A. and Admiralty and ourselves have already agreed on the Directive as regards the Civil Affairs side. I have not yet heard whether the Chiefs of Staff adopted our alternative wording for the "Military Directive" which would avoid their proposal to nominate him as "Governor of Hong Kong". On this file is the parallel affair of relations with Chiang Kai Shek in the matter of the surrender in Hong Kong. The telegram No. 38 (which we agreed with the F.0.) has made both the Ambassador and General Carton de Wiart apprehensive. The Ambassador's reaction is in No.48 and he makes no alternative suggestion but he refers to General Carton de Wiart's telegram No. 50 in which the latter makes(in paragraph 6 the suggestion that H.M.G. might be nominated to accept "the civic and territorial surrender of Hong Kong" from the Japanese Governor and at the same time a British representative would accept the military surrender of the Jap garrison on behalf of the C.in C., China theatre.
You will remember that General MacArthur's General Order No. 1 nominates Chiang Kai Shek to accept the surrender of Japanese forces within China, and it is to be noted that in General Carton de Wiart's telegram No. 51 (immediately following No.50) that he says that in his interview with Chiang Kai Shek, the Generalissimo at no time referred to Hong Kong as being part of China. It is reported now that General MacArthur is instructing or has instructed the Japanese to surrender in Hong Kong to Admiral Harcourt. It is possible in the Foreign Office view that since Washington has received Chiang Kai Shek's suggestion of his delegating to the British Commander the function of accepting Jap surrender in Hong Kong, the President may instruct General MacArthur to use that form of words, viz., delegation by Chiang Kai Shek,in the further General Order which it is expected they will issue. The Foreign Office could not tell me whether there was any chance of any British authority at Washington or draft of such fresh General Order. unlikely that "delegation" will be Order. It is not mentioned in any instance in the existing G.O.
Tokyo seeing a
To my mind it is mentioned in the
I told the F.0. that we could not agree to the complicated compromise suggested by General Carton de Wiart, and that we must maintain our stand firmly onthe fact that at no time has the Generalissimo been empowered to concern himself with a Jap surrender in Hong Kong, and that the conception of two surrenders, (a) a civic and territorial surrender from a Japanese Governor and (b) a military surrender by presumably some Japanese General would be bad enough, without poisoning the whole issue by (b) being agreed by us to be a matter in which we are acting only on behalf of General Chiang Kai Shek.
27.7.45
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