Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, The Paris Peace Conference, 1919, Volume VI

Paris Peace Conf. 180.03401/36½

CF–36A

Notes of a Meeting Held at President Wilson’s [House] in the Place des Etats-Unis, Paris, on Tuesday, May 27, 1919, at 4 p.m.

Paris, May 27, 1919, 4 p.m.

• Present
  • United States of America
    • President Wilson.
  • British Empire
    • The Rt. Hon. D. Lloyd George, M. P.
    • Lieut-Col. F. H. Kisch, D. S. O.
  • France
    • M. Clemenceau.
    • Gen. Mordacq.
    • Sir Maurice Hankey, K. C. B., Secretary.
    • Professor P. J. Mantoux, Interpreter.

1. M. Clemenceau said that he had made a very full investigation in regard to the various points raised by Mr. Lloyd George at the morning meeting. The first point related to the dispatch to General Pilsudski. The Polish Ukrainian Armistice

General Mordacq said that on May 22nd, M. Clemenceau had given him the dispatch, which he had sent to the Head of the French Mission at Warsaw, with instructions that it was to be given both to General Pilsudski and to General Haller, and that he was to telegraph when he had done this. On the 23rd May, the Head of the French Mission had replied, asking for the dispatch to be repeated. This had been done and an acknowledgment had been asked for. No reply was received on Saturday and so a telegram had been sent asking whether the dispatch had been received. The reply had been that the dispatch could not be deciphered and it turned out that the wrong key had been used for deciphering. The right key to the cipher had then been communicated. On Sunday no reply was received, and a telegram was sent to ask whether the message had been received, deciphered and understood. It was only on Monday, the 26th, that a telegram had been received to say that the dispatch had been deciphered and understood, and the necessary action taken.

M. Clemenceau said he had a telegram which showed that General Henrys said that General Haller had now done the right thing and sent his troops to the German front. He was not satisfied, however, about the treatment of the dispatch.

Colonel Kisch said that General Henrys said that General Haller’s troops had first been sent to the North of Lemberg but now they had been brought back to the German front.

M. Clemenceau said that Mr. Lloyd George’s story that the French Minister had supported the employment of General Haller’s Army on the Ukrainian front probably had its foundation in the fact that the French Minister presided at a Committee, one of the recommendations of which by a large majority was that the Allied and Associated Powers should not make a reservation about the employment of General Haller’s Divisions. General Henrys had said that M. Dmowski¹ wanted the whole matter transferred to Marshal Foch, and this probably was the foundation of the idea that the French were supporting the action of the Poles. Rightly or wrongly the Poles believed that they had the support of Marshal Foch.

Mr. Lloyd George recalled that Marshal Foch had wanted to send General Haller’s Army to Poland through Lemberg. He said he was perfectly satisfied now that the matter was in M. Clemenceau’s own hands.

Villa Majestic, Paris , 27 May, 1919.

1. Roman Dmowski, Polish plenipotentiary to the Peace Conference.