852.01/124a: Circular telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in France (Bullitt)
Although our decisions will be based upon our own independent study of the situation and circumstances as the occasions may arise, we [Page 543] desire to be kept currently informed of the French Government’s attitude toward recognition of the Spanish insurgents either as belligerents or as a government. We are anxious, however, that your efforts to obtain this information should be most discreet and that the French Government should not receive the impression that you are acting upon specific instructions from your government. We suggest, therefore, that in your conversations with the appropriate officials you give the impression that your interest in this matter is due merely to your own desire to keep yourself fully informed for background purposes concerning any developments which might have some significance with regard to the general European situation.
Repeat mutatis mutandis to Embassies at London, Berlin and Rome.