Cairo Conference
The Cairo Conference, held in 1943, was a significant wartime meeting involving Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek. The primary focus of the conference was to strategize the postwar order in Asia, particularly regarding the decolonization efforts against European powers and the ongoing threat posed by Japan. Roosevelt aimed to position China as a key player, or one of the “Four Policemen,” in maintaining stability in the region. However, challenges arose due to Chiang's perceived weaknesses, corruption, and the complexities of Allied commitments in other theaters of war.
During the conference, Roosevelt made promises to bolster Chinese military efforts, including plans for operations in Burma. Yet, as the war progressed, these commitments were difficult to fulfill, leading to tensions between the Allies. The Cairo Declaration was a significant outcome, outlining the future territorial arrangements concerning Japan, including the return of territories to China and the promise of Korean independence. Ultimately, while the conference aimed to strengthen China’s role in the postwar world, the realities of political dynamics and military challenges led to subsequent complications, including the eventual rise of the Chinese communists.
Cairo Conference
The Event World War II summit of Allied leaders that resulted in a declaration imposing peace terms on Japan
Date November 22-26, 1943
Place Cairo, Egypt
The summit was attended by U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt, British prime minister Winston Churchill, and Chinese Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek. Roosevelt used the meeting to bolster Chiang’s standing as an important ally and to discuss Far Eastern military strategy and postwar planning. The conference produced the Cairo Declaration, an agreement signed by the three Allied leaders in attendance regarding peace terms to be imposed on Japan.
At Cairo, Franklin D. Roosevelt, much to Winston Churchill’s annoyance, was preoccupied with shaping the postwar world in Asia. In an effort to end British colonial rule over India, Burma, Malaysia, and Hong Kong, Roosevelt looked to China to act as a counterweight against European colonialism in Asia. This, he hoped, would not only secure permanent decolonization in the region but also offer protection against a resurgent Japan, as well as check possible Soviet expansion in Asia. Roosevelt thus envisioned China as one of the “Four Policemen” that would maintain peace and order after the war.
Roosevelt faced several problems in pursuing his vision of China as a great power. Chiang Kai-shek’s political weakness, recognized by Churchill and all American diplomatic and military officers assigned to China, especially General Joseph Warren Stilwell, complicated matters. They all viewed Chiang as corrupt, ineffective, and tyrannical, and they believed that he would lose a power struggle with the Chinese communists after the war. Moreover, Roosevelt could not fulfill his promise of increasing Allied assistance to China due to commitments to the ongoing Italian campaign and Operation Overlord.
Roosevelt, nonetheless, tried to bolster China’s confidence and offer political encouragement to Chiang. To keep China in the war, Roosevelt promised to arm ninety Chinese divisions. He also discussed plans for an offensive in northern Burma, accompanied by an Allied amphibious assault on the Andaman Islands in the Bay of Bengal, to open a supply route to China. Such promises, however, quickly fell victim to the realities of the war. By 1943, the China-Burma-India theater had lost much of its significance in the Allied war effort. The United States had recently captured Tarawa, which put it within striking distance of the Mariana Islands. The capture of those islands would reduce the need for Allied air bases in southern China to attack Japan. Nor could Roosevelt overcome Churchill’s opposition to the proposed Burma operation. Furthermore, at the Tehran Conference (which succeeded the Cairo Conference), Roosevelt secured a pledge from Joseph Stalin that the Soviets would enter the war against Japan. Consequently, Roosevelt reneged on his promises to Chiang, claiming that limited resources had forced the postponement of the Burma operation.
To console Chiang, Roosevelt announced the Cairo Declaration on December 1, 1943. According to the agreement, Japan would be stripped of all the islands in the Pacific that it had seized or occupied since 1914 as well as all territories stolen from China. Manchuria, Formosa (Taiwan), and the Pescadores would thus be restored to China. Japan would also be expelled from all other territories—that is, the Philippines, Indochina, Malaya, and the Netherlands East Indies—that it had acquired through “violence and greed.” Korea, part of the Japanese Empire since 1905, would become free and independent “in due course.”
Impact
The Cairo Declaration probably intensified the Japanese war effort, but it kept China in the war and assured the Soviets that the United States would not seek a separate peace with Japan. More important, political and military realities undercut Roosevelt’s hope of China becoming a great power. American and British complaints regarding Chiang’s weaknesses proved to be accurate when the Chinese communists defeated the Chinese Nationalists in 1949 and took control of China.
Bibliography
Sainsbury, Keith. The Turning Point: Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin, and Chiang Kai-shek, 1943, The Moscow, Cairo, and Teheran Conferences. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986.
Stone, David. War Summits: The Meetings That Shaped World War II and the Postwar World. Washington, D.C.: Potomac Books, 2005.