852.00/7803
The Spanish Ambassador (De los Rios) to the Secretary of State
Mr. Secretary: Under dates of March 31 and April 7 of the current year, I had the honor to present to Your Excellency formal notes Nos. 138/23 and 139/04,46 in which I pointed out to Your Excellency that the Spanish war had been singularly changed since the beginning of the current year into a vast invasion of men and matériel. The Spanish Government has communicated to me, in order that I in my turn may advise Your Excellency thereof, new official data covering the same period and which strongly confirm with figures the gravity of the international aggressions directed against my country.
Your Excellency will clearly understand that the repeated acts of invasion committed in Spain represent a flagrant violation of all the pacts, treaties, and rules of international law, developed with effort during the centuries, for which reason it becomes daily morally and juridically more imperative to restore to Spain the sovereign right of unrestricted purchase of war supplies [for use] against invaders, and rebels, unless it is desired to reward the aggressors.
My Government trusts that at last the Government of the United States, because of its tradition, because of what the Kellogg–Briand Pact47 represents, because of the international principles affirmed in the Pan American Congresses, and because of those which, since last September, have been invoked by Your Excellency and by His Excellency the President of the North American Republic, will not continue to maintain the arms embargo against the people which suffer—from those who are able to purchase in this country all the [Page 181] armament that they desire—acts of invasion and aggression such as those shown by the following figures and data:
[The figures and data on recent arrivals in Spain of foreign troops, which here follow, have been omitted.]
Figures of foreign effectives in Spain.
- 100,000 Italians
- 90,000 Africans (Moroccans, Moors from Ifni, Libyans, Eritreans, Somalis and Abyssinians, all except the first being furnished by Italy.)
- 50,000 Germans (counting those disembarked during the month of March in the ports of northern Spain; Bilbao, Pasajes, etc.)
- 30,000 Legionnaires (Portuguese in the majority, Rumanians, Hungarians, etc.)
The total number of foreign effectives with the rebels in Spain amounts to 270,000.
I avail myself [etc.]
- Neither printed.↩
- Foreign Relations, 1928, vol. i, p. 153.↩