852.00/7424
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Under Secretary of State (Welles)
The Spanish Ambassador called upon me this morning and said that he had two matters to take up with me, one unimportant and one important. The latter, he said, was his desire urgently to obtain an audience with the President. The Ambassador said that recent developments in Europe had, of course, filled both his Government and himself with increased and renewed anxiety and that the Hitler speech indicating the intention of Germany to secure a victory for the Nationalist regime in Spain had only too soon made itself felt in a practical way. The Ambassador said that he had just had a cable from his Government informing him that in the recent engagements around Teruel the Franco aviation forces had been very greatly augmented through the addition of German planes of the most modern type and that the confidential agents of the Loyalist government had verified the fact that these planes had gone directly to Nationalist Spain from Germany, flying over France during the night hours. Furthermore, important importations of heavy artillery from Germany had been reaching Nationalist Spain in great quantities during the past ten days or so and it was perfectly evident that Germany today was taking a more active participation in the Spanish war than at any previous time. The Ambassador, I have learned from the Mexican Ambassador, has been considering for some time the possibility that the President might consider anew an offer of mediation between the two contending factions in Spain on the part of this Government. The Ambassador today did not specifically confirm his intention in this regard but limited himself to stating that in view of the increasing gravity of the situation in Europe, he felt he should be accorded an opportunity of laying the situation of his Government before the President for the latter’s consideration. I told the Ambassador that the President had not yet returned to Washington but that I would lay his request before the President as soon as possible after his return.
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