711.00111 Armament Control/Military Secrets/1470
Memorandum by the Chief of the Office of Arms and Munitions Control (Green)
Mr. William Francis Gibbs, of Gibbs and Cox, Incorporated, naval architects, called at my office this afternoon. He said that, first of all, he wished to express his sincere gratitude for everything that our Embassy in Moscow did for Captain C. S. Joyce on the occasion of his visit to the U. S. S. R. for the purpose of discussing plans for a battleship with Soviet officials.69b
Mr. Gibbs said that Captain Joyce had been impressed with the serious intention of the Soviet Government to proceed with the attempt to have a battleship constructed in this country and that he had been told to ask Gibbs and Cox to prepare plans for a 45,000 ton battleship on the understanding that, when these plans had been prepared, they would be submitted to Soviet officials for inspection [Page 870] with a view to a contract for the construction of the battleship in the United States. Mr. Gibbs said that he was going ahead with the preparation of the necessary plans.
Mr. Gibbs said that, in addition to the battleship which had been under discussion for so long a time, the Soviet officials had asked Captain Joyce to have prepared immediately plans for two modern destroyers of between 1500 and 2000 tons. Mr. Gibbs said that he felt sure that he could prepare plans which would be satisfactory to the prospective purchasers and which would not involve any military secrets of interest to the national defense. He would, of course, submit his plans, in accordance with the established procedure, for inspection before communicating them to any Soviet officials. He said that the Soviet Government wished to obtain these destroyers as soon as possible and that, if the plans were found to be satisfactory and a contract for their construction entered into, the construction would begin immediately and would be carried on either before or simultaneously with the construction of the proposed battleship.
Mr. Gibbs said that the Soviet Government proposed to promote Mr. Rosoff, Director of Amtorg,70 to some high official position in Moscow but that, if the plans for the construction of a battleship and two destroyers in this country proceeded satisfactorily, Mr. Rosoff would return to this country to represent his Government in connection with the construction of these ships.
Mr. Gibbs emphasized that Gibbs and Cox intended to keep this Government informed of every step of their negotiations with the Soviet Government and that his company would not take any action which the Department or the Navy Department might consider contrary to the best interests of this Government. He asked whether we would consider the construction of two destroyers for the Soviet Government as in accord with our policy.
I suggested to Mr. Gibbs that he might wish to address a letter to the Secretary of State explaining the proposed transaction and asking whether the statements made to him in the letter addressed to him on June 17, 1938,71 in regard to the proposed construction of a battleship, applied equally to the construction of destroyers.
When Mr. Gibbs left my office, he said that he was on his way to the Navy Department to tell Mr. Edison, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, what he had just told me.