740.00116 EW/11–1644: Telegram
The Minister in Ireland (Gray) to the Secretary of State
[Received 5:25 p.m.]
200. Your No. 223, November 15 just decoded at 12 hours. Half hour earlier Walshe, External Affairs, read me over telephone the same text and said that in view of your acquiescence his Government would print tomorrow text of Irish reply without further reference to American view of it. I said that this was all right with us here, that my objection to publication of less than the full record as he at first proposed on November 14, reference my 198, was of course based on my duty to safeguard our position pending instructions from Department. He said that he of course understood that I could not do less.
On November 14, censor released for publication text of Government’s statement in Commons with paraphrase of Irish reply and somewhat blunt comment at end. The general Irish reaction appeared to approve the reply as something very clever and the suggested threat at end appears not to have been generally noticed. Today the government organ on front page prints under headline “Glad of Assurances United States Statement” your press release. On inside page it prints [Page 1451] editorials from Telegraph and London Star criticizing Irish reply as evasion and stating that it is not an answer.
This strategy appears to aim at impressing Irish readers that United States is on the whole pleased with reply and bidding for popular support by inciting resentment against Britain for the attitude of the London press.
Repeated to London as our No. 63.