851.01/3612a: Telegram

The Secretary of State to the Consul General at Rabat ( Cole )

14. Following is text of State Department release, March 21.

“The absurd reports and rumors periodically occurring, and which are evidently inspired, endeavoring to create the impression that this Government upon the liberation of France intends to deal with the Vichy regime or with certain individuals directly or indirectly supporting the policy of collaboration with Germany are false on their face. The fact that this Government kept representatives at Vichy for some time for such vital purposes as combating Nazi designs, the preservation of the French fleet from German hands, and the prevention of Nazi occupation of French Africa or the establishment of military bases there, has been most amazingly and falsely represented as founded upon a sympathetic relationship between the American Government and pro-Axis supporters at Vichy. Every person at all informed knew that throughout the entire period just the opposite was the truth.

No loyal supporter of the Allied cause would make the ridiculous charge that the United States Government while sending its military forces and vast military supplies to the most distant battlefields to prosecute the war against the Axis powers would at the same time have any dealings or relations with the Vichy regime except for the purpose of abolishing it.”

Hull