500.A15a3/1175: Telegram
The Chargé in France (Armour) to the Secretary of State
[Received October 23—11:30 a.m.]
337. Embassy’s No. 334, October 20, 6 p.m. I have seen the Counselor of the British Embassy again and he tells me that yesterday the British Naval Attaché made inquiries at the Ministry of Marine, using the Figaro article as the basis for his inquiry. He was told [Page 144] that while there had been some discussion inside the Ministry itself along the lines set forth in the article and in the Embassy’s telegram No. 324, October 14, 5 p.m., and while the question may even have been brought up before the Supreme Defense Council with a view to deciding how the funds allocated to the Navy under the budget should be spent, the entire matter is far from being in definite shape.
The important point, the Counselor said, seemed to be that in any event the French had no intention for the present of making a public announcement in regard to any building program the effect of which might be unfortunate, particularly just before the meeting of the Preparatory Commission. He also said that another member of the staff of the British Embassy had called on Massigli in connection with the Figaro article, and that Massigli had confirmed, more or less, what had been obtained from the Ministry of Marine. In accordance with instructions from the British Foreign Office, which were to determine the accuracy of the report, the results of the investigations described above had been sent to London.
I gathered that the Embassy’s report to the Foreign Office included a very emphatic expression of my opinion, et cetera, that representations by the three Powers (United States, Great Britain and Japan) to the French in the present mood of the latter would be of little avail unless some new formula could be devised by which parity would be avoided and which would at the same time offer some basis for discussion: That, after all, they had failed at London and no more reason existed now to suppose that they would be more successful at the present time unless some such formula could be devised, as the French were just as decided as ever not to grant parity to Italy.
I am inclined to share the Counselor’s opinion. In a conversation I had yesterday with Léger53 he referred to the decision taken recently at the Fascist Grand Council54 not to negotiate with France along any other line except parity. His remarks were similar to those expressed by Tardieu to the American Ambassador as reported in Embassy’s despatch No. 927, October 8.
Massigli telephoned me this evening to come over to see him. He told me that the Foreign Office had received a telegram from Claudel which indicated that you were in some measure perturbed over a report regarding a proposed French program of naval construction. I called his attention to the article by Thomazi in Figaro. He said that there was nothing new in the information the article contained; that it had all been talked over at London, but that, in actuality, the [Page 145] French Government had no intention of building up to the program set forth.
Massigli then referred to the French-Italian naval negotiations, discussing the offer which the French had made at Geneva55 and the resolutions adopted by the Fascist Grand Council. He did not seem to be sanguine over the outlook for arriving at any solution.
- Alexis Léger, Director of Political and Commercial Affairs, French Ministry for Foreign Affairs.↩
- On October 7, the Grand Council pronounced approval of the report of the Italian Minister for Foreign Affairs relative to the recent (August–September) naval negotiations with France.↩
- On September 19. The conversations had continued between Rosso and Massigli, who were in attendance at the sessions of the Council and the Assembly of the League of Nations.↩