740.00112 European War 1939/10550: Telegram
The Minister in Sweden (Johnson) to the Secretary of State
[Received April 15—10:05 p.m.]
1305. My 1265, April 13, 9 p.m. and Department’s 666, April 14, 7 p.m. When I saw Mr. Günther on April 13 for delivery of the aide-mémoire he made one comment on first paragraph of aide-mémoire which was inadvertently omitted from my report. He referred to our describing the humiliating measures forced on Sweden at time when German military strength was at its peak and to subsequent efforts of Sweden to reassert sovereign rights. He remarked that language employed was unusual and would cause resentment; that Sweden had never abandoned her sovereignty and that word “humiliating” tendentious. He then passed to material part of aide-mémoire by saying that the other matter was not of sufficient importance to discuss. There is no doubt however that he intended to convey a sense of displeasure at language used.
I saw Boheman late yesterday. He told me that our démarche had given Government a great shock and that the Cabinet was very “angry” and resentful.
He said all were puzzled that we had seen fit to make such a communication which he said was the worst received by Sweden from [Page 507] any belligerent during entire course of war. During this short conversation I did not recede from stand which we have officially taken in aide-mémoire and which I had maintained during my interview with Foreign Minister. While Boheman was careful to refrain from what Swedish reply would be he made comments to effect that our requests were impossible, which led me to believe that present temper of Government is to give a negative reply. What may develop, however, during course of next few days when they have had time to reflect can hardly be predicted with any certainty. My present inclination is that I expect a negative reply, but that it will be conciliatory and possibly constructive in character with some suggestion of independent action on their part which would at least go part of the way in meeting our views. I feel confident that it is not only the Government which has been galvanized by your action but that it will also have a salutary effect on Hamberg and directors of SKF. SKF could in fact go much further in cooperation with us than it has done in past. There are means by which ball bearing production to German account can be seriously impeded such as factory strikes, machinery breakdowns, etc. and I am hopeful that our démarche may serve to shock them out of their complacent attitude “business as usual”.
Boheman told me that before the bombing of Schweinfurt SKF had in fact been very uncooperative with the Government but that since bombing of Schweinfurt Government had found Directorate more amenable and cooperative. I have purposely not sought any opportunity to talk to Wallenberg during these negotiations as British Minister had already made approaches to him prior to delivery of our aide-mémoire and I have felt that no useful purpose would be served by injecting myself into that situation. Mallet tells me that he saw Wallenberg yesterday. Wallenberg’s reaction to protest was that Allies had made serious mistake; that in his opinion more would have been achieved by indirect methods with SKF. Wallenberg said that we had made mistake not to preempt SKF production last December before agreement with Germany had been reached. At that time British for no apparent reason cut their order in half. Wallenberg is talking, however, as a business man and on the basis of SKF being a completely free agent. Our démarche may force Government to get tough with SKF. I do not feel it would be useful to go any further in detailed speculation at present time. For all the talk about contractual obligation even though sincere, the determining factor will be Swedish conception of national security.