More contentiously, he suggested that they ran the “most cohesive, disciplined, and aggressively anti-Japanese regime in China” (with the implication that more active fighting was being done by the CCP than by the Nationalists), and that they might form the “foundation for a rapprochement between a new China and the Soviet Union.” The Communists had indicated they would be willing to receive American visitors, and the US should seize the opportunity before the Communists changed their minds, as Chiang’s blockade of Yan’an made compromise harder.
