711.61/815: Telegram
The Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Steinhardt) to the Secretary of State
[Received 8:10 p.m.]
1099. I called on Lozovski54 yesterday evening. Our conversation which lasted 2 hours covered a wide variety of topics.
I took up the failure to grant exit visas to Putkowski and Czechel and remonstrated with respect to the continued detention of American citizens.55 Lozovski replied by referring to the large number of American citizens who have already been granted exit visas, saying that probably the two cases to which I had referred were among those still under investigation, and to the Ovakimian case which he asserted had been based on a fantastic pretext. He again protested at his having been handcuffed, and at the amount of bail required. I retorted that Ovakimian had not been under detention 20 months as [Page 751] had several Americans here including Putkowski and Czechel and that while Ovakimian had been detained for a specific reason sufficient to justify the court in requiring high bail, the only offense of which Putkowski and Czechel had been guilty had been to select the summer of 1939 to visit relatives in Poland. Lozovski also referred to the $10,000 fine imposed on Gorin,56 saying that it should have been returned, to which I retorted that Mrs. Habicht, Mrs. Scott, and Mrs. Magidoff should have been released.
Lozovski then changed the subject and remarked that the American Government has apparently embarked upon a course designed to terminate all trade relations with the Soviet Union as it appeared impossible for the Soviet authorities to obtain licenses for exports. I said that the unwillingness of the Soviet authorities to sell a small quantity of flax to American purchasers57 while making substantial shipments to Germany was equally susceptible to this interpretation, subject to the difference that the purchases which the Soviet Government desired to make in the United States were of a nature essential to the American defense programs while there were of course a great many other articles which the Soviet authorities were free to purchase in the United States indicating that it was the defense program and not an unwillingness to trade with the Soviet Government which stood in the way.
I then referred to the refusal of permission to members of the Embassy staff to visit places such as Leningrad while such permission was granted to American writers whom the Soviet authorities hoped would write well of the Soviets.58 He replied that there was no discrimination as the rule applied to all of the members of the Diplomatic Corps but seemed surprised to learn that permission had been refused to members of the American Embassy staff to visit Leningrad.
Lozovski then remarked that it appeared to him that during the past 6 months the American Government “had been looking for pretexts to make our relations worse,” and said he did not see how there could be any improvement in the relations between the two Governments until the matter of the Baltic ships and gold was disposed of, and recognition withdrawn from what he described as the puppet Baltic Missions in Washington. I replied that he was well aware of the policy of the American Government in refusing to recognize territories acquired by aggression and that furthermore there were large claims pending by American citizens against the [Page 752] Soviet Government for the confiscation and naturalization [nationalization] of American properties in the Baltic States.59 Lozovski replied that recognition of the incorporation of the Baltic States into the Soviet Union by the American Government would of necessity have to precede any compensation of American citizens for the nationalization of their property in the Baltic States, and referred to our position as indicating a “hostile” attitude. I pointed out that our last experience in granting recognition with assurances of future compensation had resulted in the recognition without the compensation,60 and that in any event it was my personal opinion that the present was not a propitious time for a discussion of the Baltic question, and that I was surprised to learn that the Soviet Government continued at such a critical time in world affairs to allow this particular subject to stand in the path of better relations between the two Governments.
I then referred to the seizure of jewelry and money from American citizens who had been caught in Poland at the time of their exit by way of the Soviet Union and who had of necessity not been in possession of the necessary customs declarations of entry. I also referred to the failure to turn over to me the more valuable of Ambassador Biddle’s61 effects. Lozovski started to give me the customary reply of unsettled conditions and looting but I informed him that the information which most recently had come into my possession was that the seizure has been effected by regular Soviet Army units, and that I could no longer accept the excuse of looting and disorder in that I was now entirely satisfied that all of Ambassador Biddle’s effects had come into the possession of the Soviet Army and presumably had been accounted for to the Soviet authorities. To this Lozovski replied that he would reopen the Biddle matter and have an investigation made and see if the balance of the effects not yet delivered could be located.
My 1060, May 29, noon. Lozovski also referred to the destruction by the United States postal authorities of what he described as “Soviet publications” sent to the United States, to which I replied that he should not take the subject too seriously as American publications had not been permitted entry into the Soviet Union for a great many years.
[Page 753]This he at first denied, insisting that many American publications could be found in Soviet libraries, but when I asked him whether it was not a fact that American newspapers, magazines, books and other publications were refused admission to the Soviet Union when addressed to any individual other than a diplomatic mission or an agency of the Soviet Government he dropped the subject.
At one point Lozovski referred to the exclusion of Soviet engineers from our airplane factories but when I invited his attention to the fact that I had not received a reply to a letter which I had written him about 2 months ago requesting permission to visit the airplane factory in the suburbs of Moscow, based on his assurance that the permission would be freely granted, Lozovski dropped the subject.
- Solomon Abramovich Lozovsky, Assistant People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union.↩
- For correspondence regarding the arrest and detention of some American citizens in the Soviet Union, see pp. 926 ff.↩
- This Soviet citizen had been arrested and convicted of violation of the United States espionage laws; see Foreign Relations, The Soviet Union, 1933–1939, pp. 726–730 and pp. 918–926.↩
- For correspondence regarding the troubles encountered in purchasing flax from the Soviet Union, see pp. 914 ff.↩
- For correspondence regarding the difficulties of members of the Embassy in Moscow to obtain travel permits and the imposition of travel limits, see pp. 866 ff.↩
- The United States had notified the Soviet Government that it would be held responsible for all losses to American nationals resulting from acts of nationalization or confiscation of property; see telegram No. 276, May 16, 1940, to the Chargé in the Soviet Union, Foreign Relations, 1940, vol. iii, p. 201, and also telegram No. 423, August 9, 1940, ibid., vol. i, p. 410.↩
- For correspondence on the failure of negotiations to carry out the agreements of November 1933 in regard to claims and credits between the United States and the Soviet Union, see Foreign Relations, The Soviet Union, 1933–1939, pp. 166–191.↩
- Anthony J. Drexel Biddle, Jr., American Ambassador in Poland in September 1939, who lost personal possessions of great value while withdrawing from the country through areas of eastern Poland after the invasion of the Red army. A considerable portion of his seized property had still not been recovered or restored.↩