740.00119 EAC/2–845: Telegram
The Ambassador in the United Kingdom (Winant) to the Secretary of State
[Received February 8—5:46 p.m.]
1400. For Assistant Secretary Dunn. Massigli called tonight at his request to present verbally French proposals regarding French zones of occupation in Austria and Germany. He stated he had presented same proposals today to Strang and would present them tomorrow to Sobolev, Soviet Chargé. At this stage he does not plan to present his proposals in writing in the European Advisory Commission.
French propose that their, zone in Germany should include (1) left bank of Rhine from French frontier to Cologne inclusive of latter city and (2) Baden, Hessen-Darmstadt, Hessen-Nassau and Hessen-Kassel on the right bank of the Rhine. Massigli also proposed that province of “Greater Berlin” be enlarged by addition of district of Potsdam.
I pointed out to Massigli that the proposed French zone would, I was sure, meet with strong objections on our part since it would cut athwart our lines of communication between the seaports and the US zone. Massigli then suggested that the omission of Baden from the US zone would cause little inconvenience to the US forces of occupation, but I did not pursue this secondary suggestion further. I gained the impression that the French Government will expect counter-proposals regarding the size of a French zone of occupation. Massigli emphasized that he was advancing this concrete proposal, even in advance of receiving acceptance in principle of the French request for equality of participation in German affairs (my 11575, December 3055) in order to expedite consideration of the French zone proposal by the Commission.
With regard to occupation of Austria56 Massigli stated that in view of the small size of the country his Government would prefer to see a mixed occupation by contingents rather than an occupation by zone. If this proposal, which he understood had been considered and rejected in the case of Germany, should also be unacceptable in the case of Austria, his Government would ask to have Tirol–Vorarlberg assigned to it for occupation, in line with the British proposal (my 1064, January 31, 3 p.m.57). Massigli noted that French occupation of Baden would give French forces access to the Boden See, and across [Page 183] the international waters of that lake to Vorarlberg, without crossing Bavarian territory, which would be, under the French proposal, in US occupation.
Full substance repeated to the Secretary of State by military channel. Please furnish paraphrase to Generals Hilldring and Strong.
[President Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Churchill and Marshal Stalin, Chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars of the Soviet Union, with their advisers, met in conference at Yalta in the Crimea, February 4–11, 1945. For the record of this Conference, see Foreign Relations, The Conferences at Malta and Yalta, 1945, pages 549–965. For the agreements reached at this Conference regarding the zones of occupation and control machinery for Germany and the question of the possible dismemberment of Germany, see the Report of the Crimea Conference, signed February 11, 1945, part II, ibid., pages 970–971, and the Protocol of the Proceedings of the Crimea Conference, signed February 11, 1945, parts III and IV, ibid., page 978.]