740.0011 European War 1939/19464: Telegram
The Consul General at Algiers ( Cole ) to the Secretary of State
[Received 11 p.m.]
97. From Murphy. Vice Admiral Fénard, Secretary General of French Africa, asked me to call last evening prior to his departure for forthcoming conference at Vichy of the High French African authorities. General Noguès from French Morocco and Esteva from Tunisia are already in Vichy. Governor General Chatel of Algeria will leave tomorrow. Governor General Boisson, High Commissioner for French West Africa, declined to attend alleging indisposition.
Fénard, who, as the Department knows, is an intimate friend of Darlan, expressed the gravest concern that the United States would [Page 249] rupture relations with France which he considers quite unfounded. He asserts that we are making a mountain out of a molehill in unduly emphasizing the importance of the small shipments of supplies via Tunisia to the Axis forces in Libya. He denies emphatically that war matériel is being shipped, insisting over and over again that it is to our advantage to overlook inconsequential shipments of foodstuffs, miscellaneous supplies and even gasoline if thereby we postpone the day of Axis occupation of Tunisia. He deplores Darlan’s failure before the fact to take our Ambassador into his confidence in this and related matters but claimed in Darlan’s behalf that the risk of communicating such information to us is too great: First, because of the detailed German surveillance exercised over Vichy’s activities; and second, because so much confidential information seems to leak out of Washington over the radio and through the press.
He said: “Please tell your Government that I know that Admiral Darlan is persuaded that Germany will lose this war and that the Marshal65 and he are striving by every means known to them to gain time until the Allied forces are equipped to destroy the Axis”. He said that we should have no doubts where French sympathies lie and that when the time is ripe but not before we could count on French support. Concluding 2 hours of pleading and harangue Fénard urged that we should give French Africa, where our cause he said is popular, economic support to enable it to live as well as to enable us to extend our influence. He urges that the total amount of goods necessary for this purpose is so insignificant and so far from being a decisive factor that we run absolutely no risk.
After months of association with Fénard I am convinced of his sincerity and I know that his sympathies are definitely on our side.
Repeated to Tangier, Vichy, and London. [Murphy.]
- Marshal Pétain, French Chief of State.↩