File No. 654.119/555a
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in France ( Sharp)
5771. For McFadden [from War Trade Board]:
No. 339. Following is text of a letter dated September 28, 1918, signed by McCormick and addressed to the Deputy High Commissioner of the French High Commission.
[Page 1650]I have the honor to acknowledge receipt of your letter of September 251 on the subject of the renewal of trade agreements with Switzerland. The War Trade Board has considered with the greatest deference the observations contained in your letter relative to the place of conducting the negotiations with Switzerland which are occasioned by the expiration of the agreement of December 5, 1917, between the War Trade Board and the Government of Switzerland. The judgment of your Government upon Swiss matters has always been regarded by the War Trade Board as entitled to very unusual weight, and it is therefore a matter of satisfaction that we find that in those aspects of the question which appear of the most fundamental importance, the views of M. Lebrun are in substantial accord with those of the War Trade Board.
We first of all agree that the new Swiss arrangement should be inter-Allied in character, and not the mere isolated act of one of the Associated Governments.
We further agree that Paris is the point at which information is best obtainable as to what are the demands which the Associated Governments should make of Switzerland. The most important of these demands will, we believe, relate to lumber and manufactured goods and credits with which to finance purchases in Switzerland. We fully agree with M. Lebrun that this program must be studied before it is presented to Switzerland. Not only so, but we agree that it should be studied at Paris, which is admittedly the point at which the program of Allied requirements can best be worked out. It is our hope that the French Government in collaboration with the representatives of the Associated Governments will at once inaugurate the working out of such a program on which the Associated Governments can agree prior to the presentation thereof to Switzerland.
When this program has been worked out, we feel, however, that it should not be presented to the Swiss Government at Berne or Paris, or, indeed, that any Allied demand should be presented at all as the initial step of a negotiation. We are very firmly of the opinion that the negotiation should be made to take the form, not of demands by the Associated Governments on Switzerland, but rather a request by Switzerland for ships, wheat, cotton, etc., to the granting of which request, after it is made, the Allied program will be attached as a condition. Were the Associated Governments to send representatives to Berne, or even to Paris, as suggested, it will, we conceive, be difficult to prevent ourselves being put in a position of the initiating party seeking material gains from Switzerland. On the other hand, if we wait the sending out by Switzerland of delegates to seek means to sustain Switzerland’s economic life, then we will secure a greater moral advantage in the negotiation. If such delegates are sent, they would naturally come to Washington, where it so happens that for the past year the Swiss Government has been asking and obtaining the ships, foodstuffs, and raw materials on which her national life has depended. There has thus gradually been created at Washington, during the past months, an atmosphere which we believe cannot but be most conducive to a satisfactory negotiation and we believe [Page 1651] that it is at Washington that the Associated Governments can most readily secure what they require as a condition to acceding to the pleas for relief which Switzerland will there renew.
It is, of course, to be understood that negotiations held at Washington would be inter-Allied in character and that a representative of the French Government should be an active participant in all discussions. It would further be the purpose of the War Trade Board to keep in the foreground of all discussions the predominant position occupied by France with respect to Switzerland, in that, among other things, it is only by French consent that port and railroad facilities are made available to transport commodities to Switzerland. It would accordingly be clear in our minds, as in those of the Swiss delegates, that no ration for Switzerland should be determined upon, unless fully approved in advance by the French Government. It is, indeed, our opinion that the Allied views relative to a ration for Switzerland should at once be worked out at Paris or Berne, where committees familiar with the rationing of Switzerland have their seat, and where information as to Swiss needs is most readily available.
I shall appreciate it, my dear Mr. Commissioner, if you will transmit to your Government the views of the War Trade Board as above expressed. May I also ask that you make very clear that the suggestion that negotiations be held at Washington is not prompted by any selfish thought of enhancing the prestige of the United States, least of all at the expense of France, whose noble sacrifices, to which you refer, and whose accomplishments confer a prestige which no mere possession of physical resources can approach? Our suggestion is based purely on the belief that by permitting the Swiss negotiators to come to what happens to be the source of the greater part of what they will desire, we can more effectively accomplish those practical results which the Associated Governments may wish to attain. We further are confident that the negotiations can be conducted in this manner without prejudice to the peculiar rôle of France toward Switzerland, which the War Trade Board freely recognizes.
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