740.0011 European War 1939/14105: Telegram
The Chargé in France (Matthews) to the Secretary of State
[Received 8:30 p.m.]
1046. I asked Rochat this morning whether there have been any new developments in the African question. He replied thankfully that all is quiet there “for the moment” and that there has been no further German pressure. I said that I was glad to hear it and that I earnestly hoped the French Government has no illusions as to what facilities of any sort given to the Germans at Bizerte or elsewhere may mean to relations between the French Government and the United States. He replied that the Government is only too well aware of this and remarked upon the “very unfavorable” reaction in the United States to the Marshal’s recent statement of policy68 (concerning which, he said, Henry-Haye had telegraphed). I said that we here agreed that insofar as that statement had been interpreted abroad as an important step along the road to increased collaboration with Germany, we felt the interpretation to be wrong. I added that he must not be surprised, however, with the situation as it is today that any step toward totalitarianism is stamped by American opinion as “made in Germany”. I hoped, I said, that, however wrong this interpretation of the Marshal’s speech may be, the fact that it is so viewed in the United States may serve to bring home to those in authority in France the great seriousness with which we should view any step toward closer collaboration between France and Germany, particularly in an area which so directly concerns our own security as Africa.
Repeated to Algiers.
- Presumably reference is to Marshal Pétain’s radio address of August 12, 1941; for text, see New York Times, August 13, 1941, p. 4.↩