800.51W89 France/949
Memorandum by the Acting Secretary of State
The French Ambassador left with me this morning under instructions his Government’s reply in connection with the installment on the French debt due to-day. It was a statement of inability to pay.
The Ambassador went on to say that his Government had advised him that his (the Ambassador’s) urgent representations with respect [Page 883] to a “token payment” had been carefully considered, but that the Government had reached the conclusion that, as there had been no change in the situation since last June,—that is, that no new factor had been introduced into the situation,—the Government did not find it possible to ask of a hostile Assembly any appropriation for this purpose. The Ambassador said that, if the United States had come to some definite solution of the debt problem with the British Government, a new important factor would have occurred and that in all likelihood the French Cabinet would have found itself in a position to request of the Assembly payment on account. I made no comment and in reply to inquiries from the Ambassador as to the nature of our reply to his note, I assured him that it would merely be a brief acknowledgment.