500.A15A4/2600⅓
The Under Secretary of State (Phillips) to the Chief of the Division of Western European Affairs (Moffat)
[Washington,] October 22,
1934.
Mr. Moffat: The President made the following suggestion to me today; he threw it out as a mere thought, not in any sense as something that we were necessarily to follow; he envisaged an understanding between the United States, Great Britain and France and possibly other powers in the following terms:
- 1.
- The signatory powers agree over a period of 10 years that they will not allow any armed forces to cross the frontier of any neighbor nation or of any other nation and that such an act is declared to be the act of an aggressor.
- 2.
- Every signatory power agrees that, in the event of any act of aggression, as defined above, it will decline to trade in any manner, shape or form with an aggressor. If any question should arise with regard to the act of an aggressor as, for example, two nations sending armies across the border simultaneously, each signatory power will agree not to trade with the aggressors.
- 3.
- At the end of five years, the League of Nations will call a disarmament conference, in view of this agreement, to discuss the limitation of armament and also the extension and strengthening of the agreement itself.
I should be glad to have an expression of your views.
W[illiam] P[hillips]