Bohlen Collection
British Proposal Regarding Venezia Giulia1
Notes for the Secretaries of State in Regard to Venezia Giulia
I should like to draw the attention of my colleagues to the fact that the province of Venezia Giulia in the northeast of Italy is a potential powder magazine. It is therefore likely that there will, as the war draws to a close, be clashes in this area between the Yugoslavs and the Italians, and we must prevent these outbursts to the best of our ability.
We had originally intended to set up Allied Military Government over the whole province up to the 1937 frontier but we now have doubts whether this would be a very satisfactory course for the following reasons. Tito has not yet put his views in writing but he has made it pretty clear that he will not agree to such a proposal. He certainly intends to administer himself the considerable areas which he claims for Yugoslavia and part of which are already controlled by his Partisans. Even if under extreme pressure he was forced to accept Allied (British) Military Government his Partisans would remain in arms throughout the district and it would be a miracle if sooner or later they did not obstruct our Military administration. We should then have to take forceful measures to assert our authority and fighting might begin. Alternatively there might be clashes between the Yugoslav Partisans and the Italian Partisans, both trying to hold as much territory as they could. In that case also we should have to intervene to keep the peace by force. I would therefore ask my colleagues to agree to establish some body for the purpose of working out a provisional line of demarcation in the Venezia Giulia between the area to be controlled by Tito and the area over which we should establish Allied Military Government. We have made an attempt ourselves to draw up such a line based for the most part of ethnic considerations. But obviously we cannot jointly agree on a line now, all we can do is agree to the principle that there should be such a line and that some body of technicians should be established for the purpose of determining it. After that it would no doubt be for His Majesty’s Government to obtain Tito’s acceptance of it. But if they do this His Majesty’s Government would like to be able to say that both their Allies agree with the proposal.
[Page 889]Finally I would point out that in any case, even if the area west of my suggested provisional line is allotted to Tito, it will be necessary, in the early stages at any rate, for our Supreme Commander to make use of the communications from Trieste northwards in which case he would have to take suitable measures to that end. It might later be possible for him to arrange for his communications to Austria to pass further to the west.