611.60F31/4–2646: Telegram
The Ambassador in Czechoslovakia (Steinhardt) to the Secretary of State
u.s. urgent
[Received 10:45 p.m.]
637. Department’s 360, April 25.21 The Embassy has at no time undertaken any discussions or negotiations looking toward a commercial agreement between the United States and Czechoslovakia as no instructions to undertake the same have ever been received from the Department.
Insofar as concerns Kunosi’s proposal that an interim commercial arrangement be negotiated in Washington next week I suspect that [Page 191] Kunosi, who has pronounced Communist leanings, is motivated by a desire to enable the Communist party to announce to the Czechoslovak public before the general elections on May 26 the conclusion of a commercial agreement with the US and claim the same as having been achieved by it. Since the Czechoslovak authorities have not up to the present time shown any haste in seeking to conclude a commercial agreement with the US, I can place no other interpretation on Kunosi’s desire for action “next week” than the political motive outlined above.
In my opinion an interim commercial arrangement would be both undesirable and unsatisfactory particularly as most-favored-nation treatment is now in effect.
I am also of the opinion that any negotiations looking to a commercial agreement should be carried on in Washington between the Department and the Czechoslovak Embassy because of the highly technical nature of such negotiations and the presence in Washington of American experts familiar with our tariff schedules.
- Not printed; it stated that Alexander Kunosi, Deputy Director of the Economic Section of the Czechoslovak Foreign Ministry, had requested the negotiation of an interim commercial arrangement. The Department urgently requested Steinhardt’s views and a report on the progress of negotiations on the matter in Praha. (611.60F31/4–2546)↩