811.24 Raw Materials/526a: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Chargé in the United Kingdom (Johnson)
72. The Department is giving consideration to releases of rubber that should be made by the International Committee to supply American requirements during 1940 and is carrying on a series of discussions with Mr. Viles16 and rubber manufacturers. The following is offered for your background information at the present stage and it is requested that you supply the Department with your own thoughts and suggestions and all available information as to the thinking of British Government officials and members of the International Committee regarding the matter.
It is expected that American consumption during 1940 will average at least 150,000 tons per quarter. In addition it is believed that commercial stocks (which were about 135,000 tons at the end of December) should be increased by upwards of 100,000 tons as promptly as may be done without putting pressure on prices. Since apparently there will be about 60,000 tons of agreement rubber17 to be delivered after the first quarter, it seems that there will be ample justification for an 85 percent rate of release for at least the second and third quarters, which probably would make possible an addition of approximately 40,000 tons to commercial stocks in each of those two quarters.
- A. L. Viles, American representative on the advisory panel of the International Rubber Regulation Committee; president of the Rubber Manufacturers Association, Inc.↩
- i. e., rubber to be delivered under the Anglo-American agreement for the exchange of rubber and cotton, signed June 23, 1939, Department of State Treaty Series No. 947, or 54 Stat. 1411. For correspondence concerning the agreement, see Foreign Relations, 1939, vol. ii, pp. 234 ff.↩