765.84/3087: Telegram
The Ambassador in the United Kingdom (Bingham) to the Secretary of State
[Received December 16—7:11 p.m.]
630. The American press agencies inform me that they have cabled fully the reaction of the British press to the Hoare-Laval proposals [Page 713] of December 8. Government White Paper22 goes forward by next pouch. The reception here, with the exception of the extreme right newspapers, continues in violent terms to denounce the plan as tantamount to a rank betrayal of trust, and strong Government supporters admit complete astonishment and humiliation.
Supplementing the point of view expressed by Vansittart in his conversation with me this afternoon (see my 629, Dec. 16, 7 p.m.), the following points reported to me from a very confidential conversation by Vansittart may be of interest:
In their Paris discussions Hoare and Vansittart came to the conclusion that the League was in reality no stronger than the armed forces of Great Britain. Laval, having pointed out that France could go no farther in support of the imposition on oils, and that, indeed, if the imposition of oil sanctions led to a state of war France might be unable to support Great Britain even with naval strength in the Mediterranean. A mobilization of the French fleet would require a mobilization order which Laval believed might result in disorders in Toulon and Marseilles, and this the French Government could not afford to contemplate at this time. Indeed, the British Government had not been able to ascertain that any state contemplated compliance with the mutual assistance provisions set forth in article 16 of the Covenant. In this connection reference was made to Sir Samuel Hoare’s statement: “if the risks for peace are to be run they must be run by all. The security of the many cannot be insured solely by the efforts of a few, however powerful they may be.”23
Consequently Vansittart felt it necessary, and persuaded Hoare to the same point of view, that the British Cabinet must understand the League powers today were not prepared to carry to its logical conclusion the policy of stopping aggression, and that if this were true in the present instance, vis-à-vis a small power like Italy, what a catastrophe it would be for England if this country lulled itself into a false sense of security in the next 2 years, believing that the League would be able to stop German aggression.
These arguments were the basis used in obtaining Baldwin’s acquiescence on Sunday and Cabinet agreement on Monday for the proposed terms to be sent off to Rome and Addis Ababa.