300.115(39) City of Flint/25: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Steinhardt)
212. It is difficult for us to understand the failure of the Russian authorities to give you full information and data about the City of Flint and particularly about the whereabouts and welfare of the officers and crew. If this information is not forthcoming without delay, I feel that you should consider sending a qualified member of your staff to Murmansk, either by air, if you judge it safe, or otherwise by the [Page 989] most expeditious means. If there continues to be evident a pre-disposition to avoid giving you adequate information, you might wish to throw out a hint, of course without commitment, to the effect that there is after all some relationship between the treatment accorded our vessels in a foreign port, and the treatment to be expected for foreign vessels in our ports.