852.00/4399: Telegram
The Ambassador in Italy ( Phillips ) to the Secretary of State
[Received January 18—8:40 a.m.]
25. My telegram No. 24, January 17, 11 a.m. [noon.]25 During a call at the Foreign Office this morning Count Ciano confirmed the substance of the information which the British Ambassador gave me yesterday. The Italian reply to the British proposals would be sent after Goering’s return to Berlin the end of this week. It would be substantially favorable but would require guarantees against the movement of volunteers in the form of international frontier control with necessary power and police assistance. He told me that during the last 2 months 47,000 French, Russian, Belgian and Swiss Communists had crossed the frontier into Spain, whereas whenever a comparatively small number of German and Italian volunteers reached Spain by sea, the press of the world exaggerated the event and their numbers. The British proposals he said followed closely the proposals which the Italians had made to the French months ago but that the French Ambassador to Rome had then maintained that his Government had no power to prevent the movement of volunteers from French territory.
[Page 231]With regard to the evacuation of foreign volunteers from Spain the Italian Government could readily assure the departure of Italians. Ciano added that the Italian Government was doing everything possible in the interests of a peaceful solution.
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