852.00/7645
The Ambassador in Spain (Bowers), Then in France, to the Secretary of State
[Received March 30.]
Sir: I have the honor to report that it is absolutely known, if not admitted by spokesmen of the British Government, that there has been a vast accession of military stores along with the very latest and most powerful of German artillery and bombing planes, and also an increase in the number of Italian guns and planes, in use on the Aragon front. This comes to me from correspondents who have been on the Aragon front. There is no doubt of it.
Whether, as charged specifically, Germany has also sent to Spanish waters a number of her submarines to join the Italian submarines that have been operating for many months, I have no way of knowing.
One fact is beyond question,—that at this hour Germany and Italy are acting openly and on a very large scale in Spain, and that the Government deprived of the artillery and the planes for which she has always been prepared to pay in gold, cannot compete. Man to man, the loyalist army can hold its own; but when the rebels are backed with the latest mechanical instruments of destruction on a great scale no army can stand against such odds.
This is all due absolutely to the Non-Intervention scheme of the British which has tied the hands of France and the other Democracies while making no pretence to enforcing the agreement upon the Fascist Powers.
With a European war seemingly unavoidable within the next year or two, the dominating of Spain from Berlin and Rome, thus surrounding France on all sides with dictatorial enemies becomes a matter of life and death to the French. The French Embassy here admits that there is great excitement in Paris.
There appears to be no doubt that the French Government has proposed to the British the ending of the scandal of “Non-Intervention”, and that Mr. Chamberlain29 is ready to break with France and to pin his faith on the good will and veracity of Germany and Italy. All this bears out what I have reported from the first days of the war regarding the attitude of the British Government. I hope that these despatches, merely realistic, have not created the impression that I have been motivated by antipathy for England, for the very opposite is true. In fact I am positive, basing my opinion on a careful reading of all the debates in the Commons and on the tone of the greater part [Page 165] of the English press, that the English people are as faithful to the principles of democracy, to the sanctity of international law and treaties, as ever in their history.…
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The effect on France is evident in the sharp manner in which she departed from her policy of taking no position until she had consulted with the British Government in the case of Czechoslovakia. The Paris Embassy no doubt is reporting fully on this phase. But from the French Embassy here and from conversation with Frenchmen here and in Biarritz I know that France feels that she has been let down by England. With Chamberlain’s idea of holding the European war off two years or so at any cost to principle she can have no sympathy if the two years are to be utilized by her enemies in building up a powerful combination against her. Should Spain become fascistic, and under the domination of German and Italian policy, France will be completely surrounded by enemies and with the Spanish frontier unfortified. The activities of the Germans along the French frontier has caused great uneasiness. I have just driven along the frontier for the first time in several weeks and I find evidence of considerable military activity on this side of the border. There are far more soldiers, and at the place midway between the border and Saint Jean de Luz where on my last visit there was one anti-aircraft gun and a searchlight, there are several guns, more searchlights and the place now swarms with soldiers. Every Frenchman with whom I have talked speaks of mobilization as an event that may come at any moment.
Respectfully yours,
- British Prime Minister.↩