852.6363/807: Telegram
The Ambassador in Spain (Hayes) to the Secretary of State
[Received May 3—1 a.m.]
1125. Your 984, May 1, 4 p.m. I do not agree that proposal to limit petroleum supplies to 100,000 tons this quarter adequately implements our policy toward Spain. The Department has not yet given me any reason for so limiting supplies and I can think of no reason myself. On the other hand there is every reason to continue to adhere to the program agreed to last December, after North African military operations had been initiated, and when Spain’s relation to those operations was much less clear than it is now. In my opinion and in the opinion of my military staff such reduction does in effect constitute a change in our Spanish policy precisely at a time when it is producing increasingly favorable results.
I recommend very strongly that the five tankers whose sailings I have authorized within the discretion granted to me in your 97025 be permitted to load these tankers at this time when Jordana has been able to arrange after bitter opposition by the Germans and Falange for the evacuation to North Africa of French refugees,26 nearly all of military age (in my 1123, May 1, 10 p.m.,27 I informed you that 850 had crossed Portuguese border en route to North Africa and that 200 Poles [Page 683] had already been evacuated to Gibraltar, thus the timing of the proposed reduction of petroleum program could not conceivably be worse) and after we have been able with Jordana’s help and against similar opposition to arrange for informal French representation here more successfully than any other neutral country, would constitute a major defeat for Jordana and might prejudice his usefulness to us if not his entire position within the Government.
I am surprised and disappointed that the Department went so far as to submit proposed reduction in supply program to Joint Chiefs of Staff before obtaining Embassy’s opinion which you and the Joint Chiefs have a right to hear before making such an important decision.
Our Military Attaché has strongly recommended to War Department and to Joint Chiefs that no reduction in program agreed to last December be made. It is clear, however, that Joint Chiefs gave their negative consent to proposal before they had an opportunity to hear Military Attaché’s recommendations.
I have always had very much in mind that it might be desirable to reduce petroleum supplies to Spain under given circumstances and when we are in a position to take military advantage of the situation which might arise as a result, and I should appreciate it if you would read my despatch 761, April 2,28 and show it to the President. But such reduction should fit into a political, economic, military plan, carefully studied and agreed to by Department, Joint Chiefs of Staff and Embassy in advance and it should not derive from a mere impression that a reduction in the program is in some unexplained way necessary in view of our military operations in North Africa, particularly when our military men on the spot who are in the best possible position to determine the relationship between the two things strongly oppose on military grounds any reduction in the program at this time.
I cannot believe that the Department would revise its Spanish policy on basis of popular impressions of Spain (which derive partly from a failure in the United States to make clear the military advantages of our policy) instead of on the basis of the careful evaluations of the Spanish situation submitted by the Embassy (to which I hope the Iberian Committee and BEW29 as well as Joint Chiefs have access) which demonstrate that Spanish neutrality has already been of great military assistance to us in conducting our North African operations and promises to be of greater assistance to us in the future. Otherwise the Embassy’s continual patient efforts to bring not only the Spanish people but the Spanish Government over to our side would be frustrated.
[Page 684]If you will review Embassy’s basic reports on Spain and its relation to our war effort since Pearl Harbor you will find that Embassy’s evaluations of existing situations and of future probabilities have been in every case correct and I strongly recommend that policy successfully followed so far be not altered until Department in agreement with Embassy and in light of changed circumstances decides to alter if after reviewing all factors involved and after carefully evaluating probable effect on our military position.