840.50/8–1944: Telegram

The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in the United Kingdom ( Winant )

7153. ReEmb 7184, September 2, 5 p.m. The Department believes that some sort of reply to the joint communication mentioned in Embassy’s 6733 of August 19, as amended, should be received before any communication is made to allied governments. The mere rejection of immediate participation as envisaged in draft A is not sufficient to warrant our communicating draft B to the other governments without Soviet permission. This is particularly true since the concept of the Interim Commission was developed subsequent to the original Soviet statement agreeing in principle to an EITO.

The Soviet Government might wish to participate in the Interim Commission while reserving its position with respect to the invitations to a conference and therefore it would be unwise not to give the Soviet Government the opportunity of indicating the extent of its concurrence in the actions we propose to take. While the Department recognizes the urgency of this matter, it does not feel that it should become committed to bipartite action without some direct statement from the Soviet Government with respect to its attitude.

The Department is instructing Harriman to concert with Kerr to again approach the Soviet Government to press for a reply to the joint communication. It is hoped that the Foreign Office will agree to this procedure and issue the necessary instructions to Kerr.

Department notes that Embassy’s 7184 does not include Belgium as one of the Governments to whom invitations should be addressed. We assume this is an oversight.

Department has no objection to asking the Danish Legation if it wishes to be represented by an observer.

Hull