760F.62/280: Telegram

The Ambassador in France (Bullitt) to the Secretary of State

810. Personal for the President: I addressed to you 2 days ago the following letter which cannot reach you by pouch for another week. Yesterday’s events seem to me to justify telegraphing it:

Dear Mr. President: I hope this letter will reach you before Europe blows up. At the moment it looks to me as if the Czechs had decided that in the long run it would be better for them to have general war rather than give the Sudeten a sufficient autonomy to satisfy either Henlein or Hitler. They will shoot some Sudeten and Hitler will march across the Czech frontier.

The question of whether or not all Europe shall go to war is therefore ceasing to be a question of finding a basis for compromise between the Czechs and Germany. It is becoming a question of whether or not France will march when the Germans cross the Czech frontier. Neither you nor I can decide that question for the French Government; but we can both have a certain amount of influence on the decision.

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I feel that it would be an unspeakable tragedy if France, to support Czechoslovakia, should attack the “Siegfried Line” between Strasbourg and Luxemburg which is the only point at which attack is considered possible by the French general staff. As you know French airplane production is now about 45 planes per month; British about 80 per month. The Germans, at worst, even when changing types, produce 300 per month and at best 500 to 600 per month. The French have no anti-aircraft artillery worth mentioning and are just beginning to produce it. There are only 30,000 gas masks available for the entire civilian population of France. The slaughter of the entire younger generation of France would be certain and every city in France could be leveled to the ground by German planes. The French even under such circumstances would hold out and the war would be a long one involving England and all Europe. There could be only one possible result: the complete destruction of Western Europe and Bolshevism from one end of the continent to the other.

The chances are today that the French will carry out their pledge to Czechoslovakia as a matter of honor—whatever the cost. If you believe as I believe that it is not in the interest either of the United States or civilization as a whole to have the continent of Europe devastated I think we should attempt to find some way which will let the French out of their moral commitment.

I do not believe that any general appeal for peace by you at the present time would be effective. Today the Governments of both Germany and Italy hate the United States so heartily that neither one would accept any such proposal as you were thinking of making last January.48 Moreover there would not be time to summon representatives to Washington. Both Germany and Italy might however accept a specific proposal of a limited nature.

I am fully aware of all the objections to the suggestion which I am about to make. If you should act on it you would be accused of involving the United States in European politics and sacrificing another small nation to Hitler. But I feel that when the people of the United States realize, as they soon will, that general war in Europe is imminent they will not only accept but will demand some action from you which may promise to stop it.

If and when a German march across the border of Czechoslovakia seems imminent I think that you should take action of the following nature:

Call to the White House the Ambassadors of England, France, Germany, and Italy. Ask them to transmit to Chamberlain, Daladier, Hitler, and Mussolini your urgent invitation to send representatives at once to The Hague to attempt to work out a peaceful settlement of the dispute between Germany and Czechoslovakia. Add that if the four Governments desire, a representative of the United States will sit with them. You should also make a personal appeal of the sort that [Page 511] you know best how to make referring to the fact that we are the children of all the nations of Europe, that our civilization is a composite of all the civilizations of Europe, that just as we are grateful for Shakespeare so are we grateful for Beethoven, that just as we are grateful for Moliere so are we grateful for Leonardo da Vinci et cetera, that we cannot stand by and watch the beginning of the end of European civilization without making one last effort to stop its destruction; that you are convinced that the only result of general European war today would be an Asiatic despotism established on fields of dead.

After a general conversation with the four Ambassadors you might reinforce your action by personal conversations with each Ambassador stressing to the German Ambassador the fact that France will fight and England will fight, that war in Europe today can end only in the establishment of Bolshevism from one end of the Continent to the other, that your proposed conference will leave the Bolsheviks beyond the swamps which divide the Soviet Union from Europe and are Europe’s real eastern boundary. I think that even Hitler would accept under such circumstances.

The conference at The Hague would probably have to recommend that a plebiscite be held in Czechoslovakia to determine the will of the different peoples of that country. If the Czechs should refuse to hold such a plebiscite the French would have an escape from their desperate moral dilemma and general European war would be avoided.

You would be accused, or the man sent to The Hague as your representative would be, of selling out a small nation in order to produce another Hitler triumph. I should not hesitate to take that brick on my head and I don’t think you should either if thereby you could avoid a general European war.

I could make this letter 50 pages long filled with explanations, but as between you and myself I feel no explanations are needed. You, at least, will know that I have not become either a cynic or a lover of Hitler. I have thought this matter over night after night and I am convinced that this highly unpleasant course is the one that we should pursue and the only one that offers a chance of success.

If you should consider that this proposal is sound I think you should work out at once your statement to the Ambassadors so that you can spring it at a moment’s notice. The moment has not yet arrived; but it may soon.

It would be fatal I believe to communicate your intention to any government including the British. They would at once relax their own efforts to reconcile the Czechs and Germans because they would feel that at last they were getting the United States tied up in European political problems. Furthermore they would in confidence, tell all their friends in Europe and you could certainly in that event count on refusals from Hitler and Mussolini.

You would of course make it clear to the people of the United States that your action was directed toward this one emergency and that you had no intention of involving the United States in all the disputes of Europe.

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In addition I believe that it would help immensely if you should call in St. Quentin49 and tell him that you hope France will not commit suicide and if you would authorize me to say the same thing for you to Daladier.

In any event as soon as you have considered this suggestion will you please send me a telegram containing one word either “affirmative” or “negative”.50

Concluding paragraphs of letter not telegraphed since they are entirely personal.

Bullitt
  1. See pp. 115 ff.
  2. René de Saint-Quentin, French Ambassador in the United States.
  3. No reply to this message has been found in Department files.