File No. 763.72119/378

The Greek Chargé ( Vouros ) to the Secretary of State

[Translation]
No. 64

Mr. Secretary of State: Pursuant to the orders I have just received from my Government, I have the honor to communicate herein below to your excellency the answer of the Royal Government to the communication of the peace proposal which the Government of the United States was pleased to forward to it through its representative at Athens.

The note bore date of January 8.

The Royal Government acquainted itself with the most lively interest with the step which the President of the United States of America has just taken with a view to the termination of a long and cruel war that is raging among men. Very sensible to the communication that has been made to it, the Royal Government highly appreciates the generous impulse as well as the thoroughly humane and profoundly politic spirit which prompted the suggestion.

Coming from the learned statesman who presides over the destinies of the great American Republic and looking to a peace honorable for all as well as to the strengthening of beneficent stability in international relations, it constitutes a memorable page, in history. The remarks therein made about the sufferings of neutral nations by reason of the colossal conflict and also about the guaranties which would be equally desired by the two belligerent parties for the rights and privileges of every state have particularly struck a sympathetic echo in the Greek soul. Indeed there is no country that has had so much to suffer from that war as Greece, although it kept aloof from it.

Owing to exceptionally tragic circumstances it has been less able than the other neutral countries to esceape a direct and pernicious [Page 17] action of the hostilities between the belligerents. Its geographical situation contributed to weakening its power to resist violations of its neutrality and sovereignty to which it had to submit for the sake of self-conservation.

At this very moment, deprived of its fleet and nearly disarmed, our country, pestered by a sham revolt which is taking advantage of foreign occupation, is hemmed in through a strict blockade which cuts off all communications with neutrals and exposes to starvation the whole population, including absolutely harmless persons, old men, women, who under the elemental principles of the law of nations should be spared, even though Greece were a belligerent. Yet Greece is still endeavoring to remain neutral by every possible means. Nothing more need be said to show how any initiative conducive to peace, apart from humane considerations of a general character, is apt to serve Greece’s vital interests.

The Royal Government would certainly have hastened to the front rank of those who acceded to the noble motion of the President of the United States of America in order to endeavor as far as it lay in its power to have it crowned with success, if it had not been excluded from communication with one of the belligerents while with the others, it had to wait for a settlement of the grievous difficulties which now bear upon the situation of Greece.

But the Royal Government with the full intensity of its soul watches the invaluable effort of the President of the United States of America, desiring its earliest possible success, and forms the most sincere wishes that it will succeed. Having from the very first days of the European war had in mind the establishment of a contact among the neutrals for the safeguard of their common interests, it is glad of the opportunity now offered to have an early exchange of views should it be deemed opportune and declares itself ready to join, when the time comes, in any action aiming at the consolidation of a stable state of peace by which the rights of all the states will be secured and their sovereignty and independence guaranteed.

Be pleased [etc.]

A. Vouros