740.00119 European War 1939/2563: Telegram
The Ambassador in the United Kingdom (Winant) to the Secretary of State
[Received May 3—6:39 p.m.]
3627. This refers to Embassy’s [Department’s] 3487, May 1, 5 p.m.61 Sir Orme Sargent today handed us the text of the proposed tripartite statement on the satellite countries as finally revised by the British Cabinet. Sir Orme stated that the text originally agreed to by the Foreign Office had been approved by Mr. Eden just prior to his absence from London for about 10 days and that it was only at the last moment that he decided to refer it to the Cabinet which had desired to suggest certain changes. Foreign Office very much regretted the delay and trusted that the changes suggested would be acceptable to the Department and to the Soviet Government.
The text suggested by the British Government is being transmitted in our immediately following telegram.
The Department will note that paragraph 3 as set forth in the Department’s 3255, April 22, midnight, has been omitted in the British draft. Sir Orme stated that this had been done since it had been felt that this paragraph might be interpreted as a weakening of the principles of the Atlantic Charter and might accordingly be of use to enemy propaganda. He stated that he did not think that the omission of this paragraph lessened the strength of the statement. Paragraphs 3 and 4 he described as mainly a redraft of paragraphs 4 and 5 of the Department’s text. Sir Orme said that he supposed that the Department would, if it agreed with the British text, clear it with the Soviet Government, whereupon arrangements could be made for its joint issuance. The British will, of course, be pleased to consider any changes in the text which may be desired by the Department or the Soviet Government.
- Not printed.↩