CO129-585-9 Sino-Japanese conflict- Chinese custom stations 14-7-1940 - 17-12-1940 — Page 55

(F 3551/1/10)

FOREIGN OFFICE, S.W.1.

24th July, 1940.

154

Dear Gent,

I write to confirm my telephone conversation with you this morning about the question of disarming the Customs cruisers at Hong Kong raised in Hong Kong telegram 3 No.440 of the 20th July.

2. We have in previous correspondence with the Admiralty opposed the purchase or requisition of these cruisers for our own purposes but their disarmament is another question. If you and the Service Departments consider the disarmament desirable from a defence point of view we should not wish to offer any objection.

3. If this action is taken, however, it should be based on the ground that it is part of the precautionary measures taken for the defence of Hong Kong. We should deprecate any mention of "hostile persons" or the use of any other phrase which seemed to direct the measure specifically against the Japanese.

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and the

4. If protests are made from any quarter Chinese may well make some protest we think they can be answered on the grounds of the overriding necessity of providing for the defence of Hong Kong.

Yours sincerely,

G.E.J. Gent, Esq., D.S.O., 0.B.E., M.C.,

Colonial Office.

Ashley Clarks