500.A15a3/811: Telegram
The Acting Secretary of State to the Chairman of the American Delegation (Stimson)
281. We assume that the statement issued by the British last night ends the possibility of any five-power pact.13 If this is correct, it would seem to us most vital and urgent that every effort should be made by you in the direction of a three-power agreement. An agreement of this kind would accomplish the greater portion of that which we have tried to bring about in the stabilization and reduction of arms. A setting would be created by it and we believe that at a later date the other nations would have to adhere in practice, even though they never do so by signature. It is as important from a national point of view as it is to the world. Although all we wish might not be gotten under our final terms with the Japanese, at the same time our ultimate aims with respect to the world are advanced and the cause of world peace is saved from the great disaster of a break-down.
- On March 30 a statement issued to the press from No. 10 Downing St., the residence of the British Prime Minister, and printed in the morning papers on March 31 said in part that “any further military or naval commitments are impossible, for that would be tantamount to tying ourselves down to military operations without being able to control the situation from which they have arisen. No British Government could undertake such commitments, which would be contrary to the whole feeling of the British people.”↩