852.00/5651
Memorandum by the Under Secretary of State (Welles)
The Mexican Chargé d’Affaires called this morning by instruction from his Government and delivered to me a formal note dated June 2.2 Upon reading the note, I ascertained that the purport of it was that [Page 319] the Mexican Government requested President Roosevelt “to take the steps which he might judge opportune in order to invite the European countries to obtain a pacific solution of this German-Spanish conflict”.
After I had read the note, I said to Dr. Quintanilla that, in view of the importance of the contents of the note, it would, of course, be necessary to give it consideration and that I would make at the earliest possible moment a formal reply in writing.
Dr. Quintanilla took occasion to say that his interpretation of the step taken by the Government of Mexico was that it felt itself helpless, because of its situation and because of its relative unimportance, to take the initiative in a matter of this kind and, consequently, turned to its closest and powerful friend, the United States. I said that I was deeply grateful for the friendly reference which the Chargé d’Affaires made and that it was unnecessary for me to tell him that it was our hope always to be able, so far as our national policy made it possible, to accede to the requests made by the Government of Mexico and continue cooperating with that Government in the interest of world peace.
I then said that I thought I would take the opportunity, for his information and for that of his Government, of laying before him certain aspects of the question.
I said that, of course, in the first place, we did not feel that we had had an opportunity of knowing clearly what the facts in the recent incident were; that, as he knew, the German Government made certain very definite statements as to what had occurred in the matter of the bombing of the Deutschland and that the statements made by the Spanish Government were quite distinct. It seemed to me that it would be very premature for this Government to rush into any situation of this highly delicate character without being certain of what the facts really were.
Secondly, as he knew, the questions involved were questions which were already receiving the most earnest attention of the Non-intervention Committee at London and that I understood the Spanish Government was likewise bringing the incident to the attention of the League. As he knew, our policy was one of independent action, but we felt that the primary responsibility for moving towards a pacific solution of the difficulty which had arisen was certainly a European responsibility.
Third, I told him I had no doubt that he had read in the newspapers the friendly and informal representations which had been made by the Secretary of State to the German Ambassador and the Spanish Ambassador, in which they had been requested to express to their two Governments the very earnest hope of the United States that a peaceful solution might be found.
In conclusion, I said that I had the very definite feeling that precipitate action in this matter, however well intentioned, might easily [Page 320] prove more harmful than beneficial in the interest of the maintenance of peace, and that I felt that the moment was one in which the European powers, who were more intimately concerned than the American continent with the controversy, should be permitted to attempt to work out a satisfactory and pacific solution.
The Chargé d’Affaires said that he would inform his Government of the considerations I had advanced and expressed great appreciation for the friendly way in which I had received his Government’s communication.
- Not printed.↩