640.0031 Danube/2: Telegram
The Minister in Austria (Stockton) to the Secretary of State 2
[Received January 27—11:35 a.m.]
10. Schober informed me yesterday German Government had advised him that British Ambassador at Berlin had asked German Minister for Foreign Affairs what Germany’s attitude would be toward an economic federation of six Danube states not named but presumably Czechoslovakia, Austria, Hungary, Jugoslavia, Rumania and Bulgaria. Bruening replied that he would consider the matter and immediately asked Schober for his opinion. Schober said he had not yet replied and was non-committal to me as to relations. See my despatch No. 397, October 21, 1931. However, he has told me frequently he regarded the inhabitants of Austria and Germany as one people, although two nations, and that Austria could not enter into any combination of states from which Germany was excluded. He also advised me that the Italian Minister to Hungary who had called with the Italian Minister here to present Mussolini’s compliments, had informed him that the British Ambassador at Rome had asked the same question of the Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs but that the Italian Minister to Hungary had not stated how the Italian Foreign Office had replied. Schober feels that Great Britain is acting in this matter as a stalking horse for France.
- The Minister in Austria was instructed by Department’s telegram No. 2, January 28, to send a paraphrase of this telegram to the European Information Center for distribution to the interested missions (640.0031 Danube/9).↩