851R.20/49: Telegram
The Chargé in the United Kingdom (Matthews) to the Secretary of State 30
[Received 10:05 p.m.]
192. As instructed in your telegram No. 146, January 7, 2 p.m.,31 I left with Mr. Eden this morning paraphrases of that telegram and of your telegram No. 104, January 5, 10 [11] p.m., and went over the North African situation with him. I gained the impression that he had not previously been fully impressed with the seriousness with which you view the situation or that he considered the attitude of the British press as particularly harmful. He took some exception to the statement that “British leaders” were approving de Gaulle’s broadcast or the present Fighting French propaganda campaign. He referred to his attempt to dissuade General de Gaulle from issuing his January 2 statement and of de Gaulle’s refusal to grant his request. He added “de Gaulle has caused me more trouble than all the other Allies put together”. He said that he had been faced with the alternative of issuing a dead censorship stop which six hundred correspondents would have known about, or of letting him go ahead. I said that since the British had largely built up de Gaulle and he was obtaining all his financial support from the British Government, and since the British have turned over to him control over Madagascar and Djibouti32 that it seemed to us in the United States that there [Page 34] must be means of bringing about a more reasonable attitude on de Gaulle’s part. His reply was that due in large part, he thought, to the Darlan arrangements, de Gaulle had become a sort of public hero in Britain; that he, Eden, had had great difficulties with the House of Commons on the question, and that any attempt to exercise financial or other pressure would inevitably bring a serious backfire in the House of Commons. He added: “I can’t censor him any more than you can censor the statements of the Willkies and Luces.”
He asked me to tell you: First, that the British had a lot of troops fighting in Tunisia and they are just as anxious for a military success as we are. Secondly, that de Gaulle is not like “a quantity of gin that can be put in a bottle”, but is very difficult to handle and that we must remember he has a large following in metropolitan France. Thirdly, he feels that it is important that all French be brought together and that they would work better under a single organization than under separate ones. I said that it did not seem to me that de Gaulle’s present tactics were calculated to bring them together, and he agreed. He said specifically that he did not care whether Giraud or de Gaulle headed such unified group. I said that de Gaulle’s allegations of “increasing confusion” in North Africa did not seem likely either to help our military operations or to bring about unity, and that I wondered whether the British had suggested to de Gaulle that he might simply offer his military support to General Giraud. Eden replied that he did not think that the Fighting French would agree to it. He added that he understood that de Gaulle was planning to send military emissaries as suggested by Giraud and that this seemed to be a step in the right direction. I said that my reading of de Gaulle’s reply (my telegram 174, January 7, 8 p.m.)33 did not seem to indicate any clear acceptance of the suggestion, and we found out later that he had based his statement on an earlier indication to Charles Peake34 by de Gaulle that he would send military representatives to Algiers, a tentative decision apparently reversed by the General later. Your statement that de Gaulle’s political aspirations were forcing General Eisenhower to take time out from essential military duties elicited Mr. Eden’s comment that he understood that “Eisenhower had returned from the front because of Darlan’s assassination and not because of General de Gaulle’s activities”.
Although our conversation was friendly throughout, I left with the impression that Mr. Eden had not fully realized the seriousness with which you view the situation, that he did not accept the view that the British are in any way responsible for the propaganda and intrigues of de Gaulle and his advisers, and that he does wish a single de facto political organization set up in Algiers which will provide for the [Page 35] elimination of what he considers unreliable elements. Incidentally he is inclined to feel that a visit by de Gaulle to Washington at this time would not be wise, a view with which I concur. (Most secret. I understand that the Prime Minister in private conversation with an American has expressed bluntly the view that the “Americans should not have one Frenchman, Giraud, while the British have another, de Gaulle”. When it was suggested to him that one solution might be that de Gaulle assume a secondary role, he replied: “No, you can’t do that. De Gaulle is more than a man. He is a movement and a symbol”.)
To sum up, I feel that, quite aside from de Gaulle propaganda and the question of British responsibility for not restraining it, there are certain divergencies of viewpoint between us: (1) the British place more emphasis on setting up some political entity which will have most of the attributes of a transitional government though not calling itself so by name, whereas we consider the military aspect of French support be more important; (2) the British Government lays great store on the strength of de Gaulle’s followers and his public support in France with a corollary emphasis on the need to get rid of all taint of Vichy and Pétain supporters in North Africa, while we, not having based our policy for the last 2 years on support of de Gaulle and vilification of Vichy, see the problem in truer perspective; (3) our policy is that of letting the French people freely choose their own government after the war, whereas the British would prefer, the transitional period which they envisage, to see a regime which owes its existence to them; (4) they are perhaps jealous of our leading role in North Africa.
I believe that a public statement of our policy is the best way to clarify the present confusion. Your telegrams Nos. 104 and 146 have been most helpful. If in addition you could give me (if a public statement seems inadvisable) a full statement of your policy—such as that mentioned in your telegram No. 6662, December 30, 9 p.m.35—it would be, I think, useful.
- Copy of this telegram in Franklin D. Roosevelt Library at Hyde Park has the following marginal notation: “I showed this to the P.M., Casablanca, Jan. 15, 1943. F.D.R.”.↩
- See footnote 13, p. 27.↩
- For correspondence relating to efforts of the United States to bring about peaceful collaboration of French Somaliland with the United Nations, see Foreign Relations, 1942, vol. ii, pp. 596 ff.↩
- Not printed.↩
- British Representative to the French National Committee.↩
- Foreign Relations, 1942, vol. ii, p. 501.↩