File No. 763.72110/1420
The Consul General at Moscow ( Summers ) to the Secretary of State
[Received March 2, 1918.]
Sir: I have the honor to report to the Department that the terms of armistice1 finally agreed upon between Maximalist, German, [Page 261] Austro-Hungarian, Bulgarian and Turkish plenipotentiaries are published here as follows:
With a view to the attainment of a durable peace, honorable to both sides, the following armistice is concluded:1
- 1.
- The armistice begins at 14 o’clock, December 17, 1917, and extends to 14 o’clock, January 14, 1918. The contracting parties have the right, beginning with the twenty-first day of the armistice, to denounce it, giving seven days’ notice of resumption of military actions. If not denounced, the armistice is automatically prolonged until one of the parties denounces it with seven days’ notice.
- 2.
- The armistice embraces all the land and aerial forces of the states named on the land front between the Baltic and the Black Seas. On the Russo-Turkish front in Asia the armistice will come into force at the same time. The contracting parties obligate themselves during the armistice not to increase the number, the composition and make-up of their military units and not to carry out regroupings in preparation of an offensive. The contracting parties obligate themselves until January 14, 1918, not to carry out any operative dislocations of troops on the front between the Baltic and the Black Seas excepting those already begun at the moment of signature of the present agreement. The contracting parties obligate themselves during the armistice not to concentrate forces in the ports of the Black Sea and of the Baltic, east of the 15th degree of longitude east of Greenwich.
- 3.
- The front entanglements of both positions are accepted as the demarcation lines on the European front. These lines may be crossed only in the conditions laid down in paragraph 4. Where there is no unbroken line of positions a straight line connecting the respective forward points occupied is accepted as the demarcation line.
- 4.
- The space between the two demarcation lines is considered as neutral, as are likewise rivers dividing the positions of the two sides. Navigation of these rivers is forbidden excepting in the interest of commercial transport. In cases where the positions are separated by a considerable space, the Commanders in Chief of the two sides will come to a mutual understanding both as to demarcation lines and as to the conditions of intercourse between the two sides, guiding themselves unconditionally by the conditions of paragraph 6.
- 5.
- With a view to the development and strengthening of friendly relations, the following rules for regular intercourse between the sides are agreed upon: the right of free intercourse is enjoyed by parliamentarians, members of local armistice commissions and their substitutes, who must carry suitable papers. For example, on two or three points of the sector of each division there will be arranged intercourse, such points being determined in agreement with the staff or committee of the division. Intercourse is permitted by day.
- 6.
- The interment of common soldiers is permitted in the neutral zone, after agreement between the staffs. Questions in regard to the return to their homes of soldiers dismissed finally from service and having their residence beyond the demarcation lines will be decided [Page 262] in the peace negotiations. This refers also to Polish troops. Persons crossing the enemy’s demarcation line without observing the above rules will be detained, whereby the term of their release will be fixed either in the peace negotiations or upon the denunciation of the armistice.
With respect to military operations on the naval theaters of war the following is agreed to:
- 1.
- The armistice embraces the entire Black Sea and the Baltic Sea east of the 15th [degree of] longitude east of Greenwich, and embraces all the naval and aerial forces of the contracting parties in these waters. With respect to the extension of the armistice to the White Sea and Arctic Ocean along the Russian coast there may be arranged an agreement between the naval and general staffs of the contracting parties. Attacks upon naval and commercial vessels of the contracting parties in said zones must be avoided now as far as possible.
- 2.
- Attacks by sea or air on ports and shores of both contracting parties in all theaters of naval war are forbidden. Likewise vessels of the contracting parties are forbidden to enter port or approach shores occupied by the other party. Flights above ports or shores of both contracting parties in all theaters of naval war are forbidden. Flights across demarcation lines are forbidden.
- 3.
- The demarcation line in the Black Sea is the line from Olinka Lighthouse, mouth of the St. George branch of the Danube, to Cape Geros; in the Baltic it is from Regul, on the western shore of Worms Island, to Bokshar Island.
- 4.
- The establishment of detailed rules of navigation for commercial vessels in these regions is entrusted to the commission for armistice in the Baltic and Black Seas. The contracting parties obligate themselves during the armistice in the Baltic and Black Seas not to make preparations for active naval operations directed against one another. To avoid accidents and misunderstandings on the fronts firing practice on the part of infantry is not allowed within five versts of the demarcation line.
Aerial forces and captive balloons must be restricted to areas ten versts behind the demarcation line.
After a series of minor administrative paragraphs, it is further provided:
Immediately after the signature of the present treaty of armistice will begin peace negotiations and the contracting parties express their willingness to withdraw their forces from Persia. To work out the details of such withdrawal of troops and also to assure the above-mentioned principles (?), the Russian and Turkish higher commands will enter at once into negotiations with the Persian Government.
Supplementary to and in further development of the treaty of armistice the contracting parties agree to take steps for the speedy regulation of the question of the exchange of civil prisoners and invalids directly across the front.
The contracting parties will take measures for the reestablishment of cultural and economic relations between the countries concluding [Page 263] the armistice. To this end measures will be taken, among other things, to facilitate, within the bounds permitted by the armistice, postal and commercial relations, the forwarding of books, newspapers and the like.
In connection with the last clause it is noted in the Moscow newspapers that German textiles, notions and other articles have appeared in small quantities in the retail trade near the front, and are being exchanged for fats and foodstuffs. German commercial and industrial enterprises are said to be soliciting orders through permanent, or possibly recently arrived special agents. German governesses are desired in the want columns of the Maximalist press.
Trotsky (Bronstein) made a report to the Petrograd Council of W[orkmen’s] and S[oldiers’] Deputies in which he pronounced the prohibition of the movement of troops from the Russian to other fronts during the armistice a triumph of Maximalist diplomacy. Kamenev (Blumenberg [Rosenfeld]) made this an unconditional prerequisite of negotiations, and the Germans were forced to agree. The opposition press observes coldly that this is pure buncombe; that the Germans have already transferred their best troops to Italy and France; that the language adopted permits anything the Germans may care to do now; and that this feature of the armistice automatically falls on January 14, 1918, whether the armistice is prolonged beyond that date or not.
I have [etc.]