851.248/411
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Assistant Secretary of State (Berle)
M. Alphand, Financial Attaché of the French Embassy, came in to see me this morning, at my request.
[Page 138]After greeting him I said that some of the occasion which had led me to ask him to come in at the beginning of the week had now disappeared. The Purchasing Mission for Indo-China had been in Washington; it was our understanding that the French Embassy had permitted that Mission to act independently and it had accordingly established contact with us. Realizing the particular position of France, and the position of French Indo-China, we had dealt directly with that Mission. They had asked to buy certain munitions, including airplanes. I said it had been my purpose to ask whether the planes in Martinique were available for that purpose.
M. Alphand said that the French Embassy recognized that Indo-China was in a particular position; and that it might act directly, and he assumed that that had been the intention of the French Embassy in permitting the Indo-China Mission to negotiate directly, without the intervention of the Embassy. This he regarded as natural, since the Indo-Chinese Mission had started before the collapse of France, and the Indo-Chinese government had been cut off in considerable measure from communication with the home government since that time.
As to the Martinique planes, M. Alphand was highly indefinite. He was by no means clear that under all the circumstances, including German pressure at Vichy, these planes could be made available. He hoped instead that we would try to divert some planes from the English orders, since as he understood it the policy was to be resistance in Indo-China.
I observed that there was French materiel here, readily available, which could be got to Indo-China in a relatively short space of time. It had moreover been made available to the French government by purchase from the United States. M. Alphand then said that he was not directly charged with this.
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