874.00/11–745: Telegram
The United States Representative in Bulgaria (Barnes) to the Secretary of State
[Received 5 p.m.]
659. Remytel 656, November 6.97 It now seems clear that Dimitrov advanced his arrival by four or five days in order to block efforts under way locally to broaden the FF (Fatherland Front) by the reinclusion of Petkov’s Agrarians and Lulchev’s Social Democrats and possibly elements of the old Democratic Party; also to support locally the intransigence of Moscow as revealed in last night’s speech by Molotov.
Mr. Ethridge’s activities here, particularly his conversations with the non-Communist members of the Govt, led to feelers being put out by the Prime Minister to Petkov, and subsequent negotiations between the Secretary General of Zveno and the Secretary General of the Communist Party looking to a way to overcome Russian, and especially Biryusov’s, objections to Petkov. Dimitrov’s early arrival was no doubt designed to put an end to these negotiations and also possibly to bolster Kimon Georgiev, should he now be tempted, as he has been on two occasions in the recent past, to tender his resignation.
However, so far as I can judge this morning, Dimitrov’s forceful statements of yesterday have not caused the opposition to abandon all hope that something may intervene between now and November 18 to change the complexion of the elections or to postpone them for a second time. Petkov told me this morning that the Social Democratic Minister, Neikov, finds himself in such a tight place under existing circumstances that he is contemplating withdrawal from the Govt in the next few days. Should he resign, the 32 Social Democratic candidates on the FF common lists would be withdrawn and this might place Georgiev in such a position with respect to the elections as to cause him to precipitate a Govt crisis despite efforts by Dimitrov and the Russians to keep him from wavering again as [Page 368] he did in August and for a second time prove Dimitrov an unsound prophet.
Repeated to Moscow as 287.