740.0011 European War 1939/4082: Telegram
The Deputy Ambassador in France (Biddle) to the Secretary of State
[Received June 22—8:40 a.m.]
56. It is natural under the tragic circumstances in which France finds herself today [?] for which the French Republic, officialdom and Army and Navy officers and personnel will be increasingly moved by a rising tide of resentment. Guided, perhaps unwittingly, by military facts contained in Marshal Pétain’s public appeal of yesterday and the pitiful inadequacy of British military help in terms of divisions and armored units in comparison with 1918 revealed therein it is likewise natural that this resentment should for the time being be directed against France’s principal ally, Great Britain. I doubt whether the British themselves yet realize the strength of this feeling though we have seen clear indications in the last few weeks that they are not being kept au courant of the hourly changing temperature and plans of the French Government and its leaders to the extent for example that we are: in fact I believe that they are being deliberately kept in the dark. It seems obvious that regardless of the terms of any armistice that might be signed German policy will be to redouble previous efforts to split the two allies and feed the flames of Anglophobia now so rapidly kindling. I need not point out that to a lesser degree we shall share the odium of this “too late and too little” atmosphere in the minds of the mass of Frenchmen who have no knowledge of the help we have been giving and who cannot comprehend our absence from the conflict.