File No. 763.72/2861
The Italian Ambassador (Macchi di Cellere) to the Secretary of State
[Received August 29.]
Mr. Secretary of State: I have the honor to address the following communication to your excellency in the name of the King’s Government:
Systematically hostile acts on the part of the German Government to the detriment of Italy have succeeded one another with increasing frequency, consisting in both an actual warlike participation and economic measures of every kind.
With regard to the former, it will suffice to mention the reiterated supplies of arms and of instruments of war, terrestrial and maritime, [Page 49] furnished by Germany to Austria-Hungary, and the uninterrupted participation of German officers, soldiers, and seamen in the various operations of war directed against Italy. In fact, it is only thanks to the assistance afforded her by Germany in the most varied forms that Austria-Hungary has recently been able to concentrate her most extensive effort against Italy. It is also worth while to recall the transmission, by the German Government to Austria-Hungary, of the Italian prisoners who had escaped from the Austro-Hungarian concentration camps and taken refuge in German territory.
Among the measures of an economic character which were hostile to Italy it will be sufficient to cite the invitation which, at the instance of the Imperial Department of Foreign Affairs, was directed to German credit institutions and bankers to consider every Italian citizen as a hostile foreigner and to suspend payments due him; also the suspension of payment to Italian laborers of the pensions due them by virtue of the formal provisions of the German law.
The Government of His Majesty the King did not think that it could longer tolerate such a state of things, which aggravates, to the exclusive detriment of Italy, the sharp contrast between the de facto and the de jure situation already arising from the fact of the alliance of Italy and of Germany with two groups of nations at war among one another.
For these reasons the Royal Government has, in the name of His Majesty the King, notified the German Government through the Swiss Government that, as from to-day, August 28, Italy considers herself in a state of war with Germany.
Please accept [etc.]