761.71/286: Telegram
The Chargé in the Soviet Union (Thurston) to the Secretary of State
[Received September 15—1:30 p.m.]
1174. The press today publishes a Foreign Office announcement which states that on September 13th the Assistant People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs, Dekanozov, received the Rumanian Minister who handed him the reply to the Soviet Note of August 29 concerning the violation of the Soviet frontier by Rumanian military airplanes and concerning the provocative actions of Rumanian border guards and military units. The announcement continues “The Rumanian note mentions the fact of flights of Rumanian airplanes along the Soviet frontier but denies that any cases of the violation of the frontier by Rumanian airplanes have occurred referring in this connection to the fact that the Rumanian Air Force had categorical orders to carry out flights only along the demarcation line and not to fly across it. Declaring in addition that violations of the frontier had allegedly been made by Soviet airplanes, the Rumanian Government considers that it is impossible to place the responsibility for the incidents on the Rumanian Air Force. ‘However’—the note continues—’in a desire to neglect nothing which will preserve good neighborly relations with the U. S. S. R. the Rumanian Government had forbidden beginning September 1st any flights in the region adjacent to the demarcation line between Rumania and the U. S. S. R.’
[Page 512]The Rumanian Government likewise denies that the incidents on the land frontier had been caused by the actions of the Rumanian border guards and military units and considers that their occurrence is due to the actions of the Soviet border guards. ‘However’—the Rumanian note states—’the Rumanian Government in a desire to preserve with the Soviet Union the best neighborly relations has officially forbidden by an order of the Chief [of the] General Staff Rumanian border guards to make use of their firearms except in the event of clear violations of Rumanian territory.’
In accepting this note Comrade Dekanozov promised to bring its contents to the attention of the Government.”
Repeated to Bucharest.