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During the past two or three months, I have noted with profound gratification the increasing interest which has been shown by the American public in the Far Eastern situation in spite of continuous reports of exciting developments going on in Europe. Your information on the Far East must have covered the indescribable atrocities which the Japanese have committed in China and the inhuman hardships which they have inflicted upon the innocent Chinese civilians. You must have also read or have been told many times about the "divine" duty of the Japanese to annihilate China so that a "New Order in East Asia" may be established to insure the peace of the world and to make that part of the globe true to the name of its great bordering ocean. You must, moreover, be familiar with the treatment which third power rights and properties in China have received in the present conflict, and with the assurances of respect for these rights and properties only to see such assurances completely disregarded almost on the very day of their utterance. Finally, you must be aware of the scheme and the struggle of setting up puppet regimes in China for purposes regarding which even the promoters themselves are having the gravest doubts and misgivings.

Interesting as these reports may be, they are nevertheless mere evidences[[?]] of destruction. But, behind the lines of destruction and fighting in China, there have also taken place in the hinterland various developments, which from the standpoints of economic progress and social advancement are of far greater and far more permanent consequences to us. I refer to the unparalleled experiment of reconstruction in the interior of China, which literally amounts to the building up of a new nation in a world of ruthless and needless destruction. This very significant phase of the Far Eastern situation, I believe, has not yet been sufficiently emphasized in the general reports and discussion. If, by mentioning it today, I could do no more than