851.01/9–2144: Telegram
The Acting American Representative to the French Committee of National Liberation at Paris (Chapin) to the Secretary of State
[Received September 23—6:47 p.m.]
52. I called this afternoon on Monsieur Raymond Brugère, newly appointed Secretary General of the Foreign Office. He received me most cordially and after stating he was a strong friend of USA, said he hoped I would pardon his frankness since he was accustomed to use the direct method. Brugère said he was completely baffled by our [Page 737] policy towards France. That while he knew the American people, and here he referred to magnificent role played by our soldiers, were sincere friends of France, he could not help but feel that on the official diplomatic level, our policy was one injurious not only to France but in long run to our own interests. Our hesitancy in extending recognition to the Provisional Government and the indications that France was to be excluded from world councils was humiliating to France and to Frenchmen like himself who felt we were treating a great continental nation with less consideration than that accorded a small Central American Republic.
“While your Government states it has never had any admiration for the Pétain67 Government, it is difficult for me who was imprisoned in Vichy when you had an Ambassador to that Government to find that you do not recognize a Government which has restored me to freedom and which is founded on liberty and accepted by all Frenchmen.”
This evening’s press carries pointed appeals for the earliest recognition and contrast[s] treatment accorded France with that adopted toward Belgium, Holland, et al.
- Henri Philippe Pétain, Chief of State of France during the Vichy regime.↩