FO371-23514 — Page 65

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amounted to 1 Sikh policeman, 11 Chinese killed and

4 Chinese wounded.

On 2nd March, 1939, General Tanaka, Chief of

Staff to General Ando commanding the Japanese Army in South

China, came to Hong Kong to arrange, amongst other things,

for payment of claims arising out of the Japanese bombing.

The usual courtesy calls were paid. and a full apology

was made to the General Officer Commanding on behalf of

General Ando. In the afternoon a Conference under the

Chairman ship of the Colonial Secretary took place at

3 p.m. General Tanaka was accompanied by his Staff

officer, Colonel Ohira and by Mr. Oda, the acting Japanese

Consul-General.

The Conference began by Colonel Neville giving

the British version of the bombing, and handing a short

written account of it to General Tanaka. General Tanaka

did not dispute our statements, but said he would like to

give the account he had had from his own Squadron Leader.

The orders for the Squadron were for the main body to

bomb Sham Chun and for one flight to bomb the Chinese

Customs House. He said that one flight mistook the

river running from North to South for the frontier river

and that they thought they were in Chinese territory.

He admitted that bombs had been dropped in British

territory and that machine-guns had been used. He added

that the Japanese had very indifferent maps, and from the

map which he produced there seems no reason to doubt his

statement. Colonel Neville pointed out that it was

impossible for anyone to bomb a target situated in the

position occupied by the Customs House without violating

British territory. General Tanaka admitted that this was

80.

The Conference then discussed the question of

The Japanese seemed prepared to pay

compensation.

whatever we asked, provided it was perfectly clear that

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there

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