Office of the Historian

500.A15A5/531: Telegram

The Ambassador in the United Kingdom (Bingham) to the Secretary of State

London, November 6, 1935—10 a.m.
[Received November 6—4:45 a.m.]

555. The Foreign Office asks urgently information on the two following points:

1.
With the concurrence of the interested Governments the Secretary General of the League of Nations was invited to send an official observer to attend the meetings of the London Naval Conference in 1930, naturally without the right of discussion or vote. The British Government thinks it desirable a similar invitation should be issued to the Secretary General on this occasion, but before approaching other powers concerned in the matter desires to know whether the American Government would be prepared to concur in this proposed line of action.
2.
The British Government have received an informal indication on behalf of the American Government that it intends to accept the invitation to the Naval Conference (see Department’s 316, October 25th) but asks whether it should be anticipated that a formal acceptance will be received by the British Government in time for the Foreign Secretary to publicly state those countries that have accepted in a speech he intends to make on November 9th.

I am informally advised by the Foreign Office that the Japanese Government has stated its representatives will not be able to reach London by December 2nd and that therefore the British propose to postpone the opening of the Conference until December 5th.91

Bingham
  1. By agreement among the interested Governments, December 9 was fixed as the opening date of the Conference.↩