Office of the Historian

86011.01/3–445: Telegram

The Ambassador to the Yugoslav Government in Exile (Patterson) to the Secretary of State

London, March 4, 1945—5 p.m.
[Received March 4—2:12 p.m.]

Yugos 46. King Peter received Dr. Rybar99 yesterday at 2:45 p.m. in the presence of the Queen and gave him the decree appointing Budisavljevic, Mandic and Sernec the Royal Regents (text of decree being forwarded by airgram1). Decree bears signatures of King and Dr. Subasic by whom it was signed beforehand in blank and is back-dated to March 2nd to correspond with communiqué issued by King Peter to the press (reference my 44 of March 32).

Dr. Rybar told me he thought the King, who appeared to be in good spirits, was finally persuaded to sign by his talk with Eden and messages he received from Molotov3 and Subasic. The message from Subasic repeated Molotov’s telegram already handed the King by the Soviet Embassy and described by Rybar as “approximately the same” as message Department gave Yugoslav Embassy in Washington (reference Department’s 26 of February 26) and referred to but did not give text of Department’s message.

Commenting on King’s choice of Budisavljevic, Rybar said he thought King had chosen him in order to have someone who had been [Page 1206] in exile. The choice is also popular in Serbia Rybar added and went on to say that he had seen a message to that effect last night from Reuters’ correspondent in Belgrade which stated that his reputation for honesty is enough to offset his being a Serb from Croatia instead of Serbia proper.

Simultaneous with the issuance of the decree King Peter signed a telegram notifying Subasic of his choice of Regents.

Sent Department as Yugos 46, repeated Moscow as 87 and Caserta as 44.

[Patterson]
  1. Ivan Ribar, President of the Presidium of the Anti-Fascist Council of National Liberation of Yugoslavia.↩
  2. Not printed.↩
  3. Not printed; this telegram reported that King Peter had issued a communiqué to the press on March 2 before he had informed either Dr. Subasich or Dr. Ribar of his decision (860h.01/3–345).↩
  4. Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov, People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union.↩