740.00119 Control (Bulgaria)/2–2245: Telegram

The United States Representative in Bulgaria (Barnes) to the Secretary of State

98. General Crane and I shall on all appropriate occasions express the Department’s concern over the failure of Bulgaria to make relief deliveries to Greece and will continue to press for such deliveries, but I feel that I should go into it once again in connection with the Department’s telegram No, 37, February 15, 7 p.m., that while we do not know precisely what Russia herself is taking from Bulgaria we do know that great quantities of Bulgarian produce are being consumed by the Russian troops here and are also being made available to meet Russian needs elsewhere. We therefore feel that the presentation here in support of Bulgaria’s commitments with respect to Greece and Greece’s [Page 161] needs for Bulgarian supplies cannot be effective without change in directives from Moscow to the Russian command in Bulgaria. The following somewhat offhand comment on the Bulgarian foodstuff situation is made in a recent letter from General Biryusov to General Crane, “The work is being done to establish the extent of foodstuff resource in Bulgaria and the possibility of supplying the troops of the Allied (Soviet) command with them.”

To GMTU [sic] Moscow as No. 32 and to AmPolAd as No. 41.

Barnes