859B.7962/13
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Assistant Secretary of State (Berle)
| Participants: | Mr. Merchant Mahoney, the Canadian Chargé d’Affaires; |
| Mr. Escott Reid, Second Secretary of the Canadian Legation; | |
| Mr. A. A. Berle, Jr.; | |
| Mr. Cumming;4 | |
| Mr. Hickerson.5 |
The Canadian Chargé and Mr. Reid came in this morning, at my request.
Mr. Cumming is drafting a detailed memorandum6 of the conversation.
I said that we had been giving careful consideration to the situation in Greenland, whose importance of course was underlined by the German air raid on Iceland. We had in mind the observations [Page 37] they had made to us and their desire that an air station be established on Greenland.
I said that our policy had to fall within the requirements of three principles:
- (1)
- We considered the Monroe Doctrine as applying to Greenland;
- (2)
- We considered that any action taken must be taken within the framework of the inter-American continental defense;
- (3)
- It was and remained our policy to preserve the status quo, the neutral character of Greenland, through this emergency, and this policy continued now.
We proposed, accordingly, to take up with the Greenland Government the possibility of their constructing and owning and operating an air field, open to the American nations. We were prepared to give them technical and financial assistance for that purpose. We should expect as a condition that such an air field would be open to ourselves and to the other American nations.
We noted the distinction in this case between Canada and the United Kingdom. Canada, as an American nation, formed a vital part of the continental defense.
Once worked out, the air field conceivably might be used by the Canadians, as a belligerent power, subject presumably to the usual rules of neutrality, namely, a limited length of time for stops and fuel to the next station (presumably Iceland)—or other similar rules. This I thought would meet the Canadian point of view.
The first step would be to send a commission of experts there, with the consent of the Greenland Government, and we were working on that. We should be glad to have the Canadians send an observer with our people. We proposed to start this right away.
The Canadians expressed themselves as satisfied.