740.00112 Navicert/91
The British Embassy to the Department of State
Memorandum
His Majesty’s Government have been considering the possibilities of allowing shipping to enter the Mediterranean with neutral cargoes bound for Balkan countries. At the moment no ships are being allowed to enter with cargo for these countries, either through Gibraltar or Suez, owing to the danger of capture by Italians in Straits of Messina or in the Dodecanese.
In the first place everything depends of course on such cargoes being able to reach their destinations safely, and it will be up to the Balkan countries to make what arrangements they can to this end with the Italian Government. Provided, however, that this can be done and that the Balkan countries carry out their undertakings in other matters, His Majesty’s Government are prepared to consider allowing neutral cargoes for these countries to enter the Mediterranean if the following conditions can be satisfied:
- (a)
- His Majesty’s Government must be reasonably certain that the goods will actually reach their destination. For this reason it will only be possible to admit a very few ships at a time and to hold up any others until the safe arrival of earlier vessels has been reported. It would be necessary to supervise loading at the port of shipment and unloading of cargo at port of destination.
- (b)
- The quantities of key commodities fixed in the various rationing agreements might serve as an upper limit, but the practical difficulty of arranging approved shipments would probably prove the real limiting factor in most cases.
- (c)
- Cargoes will have to be suitably balanced, i. e. it will not be safe to allow any one ship to carry too large consignments of German or Italian deficiency commodities. Cargoes of each ship would have to be agreed in advance with the Government of the importing country and loading checked by British authorities at shipping port, who would then issue a special pass to the ship.
It has been suggested that the Embassy might discuss the foregoing with the United States authorities, more particularly as any arrangement, such as that contemplated in the preceding paragraph, would be subject to such loading inspection or checking being made with the knowledge and approval of the United States Government. The latter’s agreement, if given, would provide an invaluable precedent [Page 52] for obtaining similar facilities in South American countries. Although inspection by the United States Customs authorities would meet the case as regards shipments from the United States, it would not be regarded as satisfactory in the case of shipments from South American countries.
His Majesty’s Government have also enquired whether, in the spirit of helpfulness, the United States Government would be prepared to prevent neutral ships sailing for the Mediterranean without a special pass in order to avoid inconvenience arising from their detention at Gibraltar. Cooperation to this extent would be valuable though His Majesty’s Government do not regard it as essential.