File No. 763.72119/1971

The Minister in Switzerland ( Stovall) to the Secretary of State

[Telegram]

4946. In a formal note Bulgarian Legation hands me telegram in English from Malinoff to Bulgarian Minister, Washington. Telegram follows:1

Kindly transmit to the President of the United States, Mr. Wilson, and to the Secretary of State, Mr. Lansing, in Washington, the following:

The Bulgarian Nation and Government were constrained to enter into the general conflict after they had exhausted all peaceful means possible for coming to an understanding with their neighbors and for realizing their race reunion. This fact Bulgaria reiterated in her note of September 20 last2 in answer to the peace proposition of Count Burián given out on September 14. If the ideas of the President of the United States are to be crowned with success, and if their realization is [to be] sought for no more in the old conception and methods of action, but in the path pointed out by the honored President of the American Republic, for the establishment of a new order of things guaranteeing freedom and justice among the nations, Bulgaria, which feels that the idea and the cause for which she is struggling find place side by side with the principles in behalf of which America interfered in this war, is glad and ready to follow that path, in order to secure the fulfillment of justice desired by her. Having this in view, therefore, the Bulgarian Government [Page 326] turns to the friendly President of the Republic of the United States, with the request that its President use his good offices for putting an end to the bloodshed on the Macedonian front by the conclusion of an armistice, after which are to follow preliminary negotiations for peace, the final settlement of the Balkan questions being left to be decided in the general peace conference. Signed, Malinoff.

Stovall
  1. The text of this telegram was transmitted to the Bulgarian Minister, Sept. 29. It was formally communicated by him to the Secretary of State in a note of Sept. 30 (File No. 763.72119/2033).
  2. See telegram No. 169, Sept. 21, from the Consul at Sofia, post, p. 326.