740.00112 European War 1939/296
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Assistant Secretary of State (Berle)
The Irish Minister46 came in to see me, at his own request. He had previously indicated the object of his visit to Mr. Hickerson,47 namely, the concern of his government over press reports emanating from the United States which stated that Admiral Raeder had ascribed his news of the proposed sinking of the Iroquois to Irish sources. The Irish government was interested in learning whether this was the fact.
As agreed with Mr. Hickerson and Mr. Moffat,48 prior to the Minister’s call, I stated that the report was true. I gave him the substance of the cablegram received from Berlin, in the course of which it was reported that Admiral Raeder, in response to a direct question from our Naval Attaché, said that the report came from an Irish neutral source which was worthy of confidence. I stated that I gave him this information in confidence for one reason only. When the report had been given out at the White House, no mention of the fact that the source was alleged by Admiral Raeder to be Irish had been made. This was because we were not sure how seriously the warning should be taken; and naturally did not wish to bracket the Irish source with a report which might prove to be merely a propaganda or similar device.
The Minister thanked me and said that he was trying to find out the exact nature of the source in question. I suggested that the proper place to inquire would be Berlin; we had no knowledge other than the statement of Admiral Raeder. The Minister agreed that this was so; though he noted that since the Iroquois sailed from Ireland, it would be entirely natural that reports of this kind would be ascribed to Irish sources.
[Page 628]I said that while we could not fairly evaluate the importance of the report, we were not very much impressed with it, though of course we had taken measures to guard the vessel.
The Minister then had a few moment’s conversation regarding the German “peace offensive”. He said in his judgment peace ought to be made at once, recognizing the conquest of Poland and not boggling much about existing settlements. I was careful to make no comment, and confined myself to observing that European statesmen in these days faced a tremendous responsibility.