Foreign Relations of the United States Diplomatic Papers, 1932, General, Volume I
500.A15A4 Steering Committee/228
The Chargé in France (Marriner) to the Secretary of State
[Received December 6.]
Sir: With reference to the Embassy’s telegram No. 673, November 27, 7 p.m.,88 I have the honor to enclose a copy of a memorandum of the confidential conversation concerning various aspects of the disarmament problem which took place between M. Herriot and the Honorable Norman Davis on Saturday, November 26th.
Respectfully yours,
Memorandum of Conversation at the Quai d’Orsay, November 26, 1932, Between the President of the Council, M. Herriot, and Mr. Norman H. Davis 89
When Mr. Davis advised the Quai d’Orsay Saturday afternoon that he would be in Paris until Monday night and would be glad to see M. Herriot if the latter so desired, an appointment was fixed for 8 o’clock that evening. As this came after a long day for M. Herriot, Mr. Davis suggested that there was no urgency about the meeting and that it might be put off until Sunday or Monday. M. Herriot, however, expressed the desire to see Mr. Davis as soon as possible and fixed the appointment for 7:45 p.m.
M. Herriot received Mr. Davis immediately. He was obviously tired and did not liven up to the conversation for several minutes. Mr. Davis opened the conversation by stating that he had heard M. Herriot had been disturbed over reports he had received of certain conversations he had had with regard to the French disarmament plan, and he wanted to know if this was, in fact, the case. M. Herriot replied no, that it was nothing that Mr. Davis had said which troubled him, it was rather the situation itself. He frankly added that he was very worried. In fact, in the course of the interview, he repeated again and again, “I am afraid.” It seemed to him that France was walking in the darkness towards a goal which it could not clearly ascertain. When he was asked to sit down to five-power conversations to discuss the vague question of “equality of right,” he was frank to state that he did not know where France would come out, and this terrified him.
He had said he would go to Geneva, and he would do so, but he wanted it to be clearly understood that he would not go to Geneva and [Page 477] enter into these conversations merely to discuss the German claim for equality of right. He would only go to discuss the entire question of disarmament as conceived by France. What did the Germans mean by equality of right? They had explained it in various ways, and he referred particularly to the German note to France of last August and the communication which they had made to the British shortly thereafter. (This communication to the British is apparently very much on M. Herriot’s mind; particularly the insistence of Germany upon heavy arms, militia, and a professional army.)
Mr. Davis then outlined in some detail the conversation which he had had in Geneva with Baron von Neurath. In the course of these conversations, Baron von Neurath had made it clear that while Germany must insist as a matter of principle upon the right to certain arms now denied them, in the actual application of this principle they would be able to agree to have only certain specific arms. Von Neurath had also made it clear that while he had come to Geneva for the Council meeting, he had been given authority by President von Hindenburg to discuss the whole question of disarmament, and in this connection he had not imposed, and if he came back would not impose, any prior conditions to circumscribe the conversations. Mr. Davis said that Baron von Neurath’s position with regard to Germany’s claim seemed fairly reasonable.
M. Herriot then explained that while the Germans sometimes talked reasonably, their actions were very different. Once, he said, he had honestly believed in the possibility of an entente between France and Germany. He no longer had that belief. In 1924, he had made peace with Germany and had evacuated the Ruhr, and had made the Agreement of London; later, he had been a party to the early evacuation of the Rhineland; at Lausanne he had settled German reparations; and now when he read the memoirs of Stresemann, he found that they called him a “jellyfish.” Von Papen was undoubtedly a very agreeable gentleman, although we would recall what his record in the United States had been. However, this same von Papen at Lausanne had proposed to him an alliance directed against England, and every 15 days he had a change of policy. After all, at heart von Papen was a monarchist, and Germany was rapidly going toward a dictatorship, and then the restoration of the Monarchy. He understood the Americans and the English and their policy, and he could trust them; he could not do the same with Germany.
These were the facts which he had to face. He felt charged with responsibility for the lives of millions of French people. He had to meet that responsibility and it made him tremble. He was afraid of the conversations which were to take place in Geneva. France did not desire to be isolated, but if he had to choose, in these Geneva [Page 478] conversations, between isolation and the acceptance of a vague principle which in its application might entail the loss of French security, he would not hesitate to choose the former. Mr. Davis emphatically advised M. Herriot that he felt that he need not fear isolation at Geneva. The United States did not wish to press France to do anything that would be against her own desires and best interests. What we wanted to do was to work towards reduction and limitation of armaments, which would at the same time increase, and not decrease, the safety of France. Here was a chance to cooperate with the United States and Great Britain in working out a disarmament agreement which would be to the best interests of all. If France rejected this opportunity, it might not soon come again.
M. Herriot then launched into a statement with regard to the French plan. France, he said, had been asked to produce a plan as to how they conceive disarmament and security, and he had produced this plan. This plan was also an answer to the German demand as to how the claim for “equality of right” could be put into effect. He had done this over the opposition of his military men, and especially the opposition of Marshal Pétain and of General Weygand. The opposition of Marshal Pétain had really troubled him. He was an independent man of real breadth and vision. And Marshal Pétain had said to him that his plan might endanger the safety of France. He could never forget the evening he had come back and found Marshal Pétain’s letter to this effect on his desk. The Marshal had said that parts of his plan would be taken up and put into effect and the rest would be lost, and France would be in danger.
M. Herriot said that he recognized that his plan might have defects, and that there were difficult points in it. People said it was too complicated, it was too long, it was too logical. After all, it was a French plan, and it had all the French defects in it. He did not insist that the question of disarmament be worked out on the basis of the French plan. We could take, if we wanted, the Hoover plan or the plan submitted to the British. What he did insist upon, however, was this: When he entered on the path of working out disarmament and equality of right, he wanted to know where he was going and what the result would be for the security of France. At the moment, he did not see clearly; he was in obscurity. He did not know where France was going or where these conversations would lead her.
Mr. Davis stated that he quite understood M. Herriot’s reluctance to accept the principle of equality without knowing how it was to be put into application, and frankly he had doubted the wisdom of [Page 479] some of the proposals of Sir John Simon with regard to according equality of status to Germany, particularly with respect to granting the right to possess every kind of weapon. Mr. Davis stated that in the conversations which it was proposed to hold at Geneva, the United States would participate, not in the role of an observer but just as any other of the five powers. Further, in these conferences he did not propose to be drawn into a theoretical discussion of German equality, but of measures of disarmament. He had been giving much thought as to whether a plan could be worked out which would permit a measure of disarmament and avoid coming to grips at this moment with the theoretical questions raised by the Germans, which were causing so much difficulty to the French. He did not wish at this time to go into the details, but suggested that before returning to Geneva, possibly some time on Monday, he could do this. M. Herriot said that he would be available at any time on Monday, and a further meeting was fixed for 10:30 on Monday morning.
Mr. Davis then said that he wished to take up one further matter, and told M. Herriot of his trip to Rome.90 He had told M. Mussolini that M. Herriot had the best intentions with regard to Italy, and that he had been assured by M. Herriot that he was prepared to consider in the friendliest manner a solution of the naval difficulties between France and Italy. It had been most opportune that the very next day, M. Herriot had made his speech at Toulouse, in which he had spoken in such high terms of Italy’s part in the war. When M. Mussolini saw Mr. Davis just after this speech, he was evidently more than gratified at the generous statement which M. Herriot had made. M. Herriot interrupted to say that this was done mainly because Mr. Davis had suggested it. From what M. Mussolini had said to him, Mr. Davis was convinced that Italy really desired the friendship of France, but she was like a woman who feared to make advances, being apprehensive of a rebuff. M. Herriot smiled and said that he understood this, and Mr. Davis added that this was, in his opinion, the reason why M. Mussolini had not yet made a reply in kind to M. Herriot’s generous overture. Mr. Davis said that M. Mussolini had spontaneously turned to Mrs. Davis at the dinner which M. Mussolini had given to him in Rome, stating, “I know that M. Herriot is a big man and an honest man.” M. Herriot intimated that he considered that the Italian situation was not of immediate and vital importance to France and, pointing in the direction of Germany, he said that it was not from Italy, but from there (Germany) that he feared the trouble.
[Page 480]Mr. Davis then referred to the naval discussions which had started in Geneva; explained how they were being carried on by conversations between the French and the Americans, the Americans and the Italians, and the Americans and the British; that these conversations were progressing; and that it was of real importance that M. Herriot do his part to bring the conversations to a successful conclusion. M. Herriot said that he would do what he could.
M. Herriot then went back to the German situation. It was obvious that he could not forget this for a moment. After some hunting through his papers, he produced a communication from the French representative in Munich, which he asked Mr. Dulles to translate. The general tenor of this communication was that the Socialist party had been cajoled by General von Schleicher, at the price of some additional unemployment doles, to take a position of non-opposition to a government of the Right, such as von Schleicher desired. This M. Herriot produced as evidence that there was no real democratic spirit in Germany, and that the military party really had no opposition. In 6 hours Germany could be in Paris. Unfortunately, there was no ocean between Germany and France. If given the Atlantic and Pacific, we would see how reasonable he could be. Of course, Germany would not start by attacking the French frontier because of Locarno. But, on the other hand, she could easily arrange for a few Poles to make an incursion into German territory near the Polish corridor, and with this excuse the invasion of Poland would start, and then who could decide who was the aggressor? They only had to remember the German claims about the French airplanes over Nürnberg during the war. Mr. Davis suggested to M. Herriot that he was unduly preoccupied, and that in all of our countries we have too many people who are cynical and who lay stress upon all the troublesome things that can happen, but that he, Herriot, was not a cynic.
As Mr. Davis got up to go, M. Herriot arose and pushed Mr. Davis into his chair, and took the chair Mr. Davis had been in, saying that if only Mr. Davis would sit in that chair for awhile, with the responsibility for the safety of millions of French people on his shoulders, he would then understand his preoccupation in the face of Germany. Mr. Davis replied that if they could each change chairs for awhile and get the other’s point of view, then there could be a meeting of minds.
The question of debts came up very casually just as Mr. Davis was leaving, when M. Herriot said that for one hour spent on debts, he spent 10 hours on the disarmament conference. One involved a mere question of money, the other involved the safety of the French people. [Page 481] Mr. Davis said that he did not wish to discuss debts, except to state that he hoped that M. Herriot would not let this question come between France and the United States to make more difficult their cooperation in the solution of other problems, such as disarmament. M. Herriot said that he would do his best to avoid any such situation arising.