500.A15a3/738a: Telegram
The Acting Secretary of State to the Chairman of the American Delegation (Stimson)
[Paraphrase]
Washington, March 5, 1930—10
p.m.
178. Reference is made to your telegram No. 107, March 4, 8 p.m., and to our telegram No. 167, March 3, 7 p.m., regarding cuts in destroyer and submarine strength.
We would like to put the following before you merely for your consideration and without any final views on the subject:
- (1)
- From our point of view a compromise with Japan giving her larger cruiser strength and reducing her strength in submarines and destroyers below present suggestions is a much less important concession than if the French were given any kind of direct or indirect political commitment.
- (2)
- The Japanese fleet, assuming that it finally included 52,000 tons of submarines, 90,000 tons of destroyers, 6-inch cruisers in an amount which in your No. 107 is indicated as satisfactory to you, and with 8-inch cruisers in the amount even to that which in No. 107 you say is desired, would still be greatly inferior to the American fleet and no national anxiety as to our dominance in the Pacific in case of controversy need be caused by it.
Cotton