861.00/5358
The Director of Military Intelligence (Churchill) to the Russian Attaché (Nikolaieff)70
My Dear Colonel Nikolaieff: Reference to your memorandum dated September 18, giving the purport of a cable from General Miller, Russian Army, Commander in Chief at Archangel, to the Russian Ambassador, Washington, requesting information whether or not a recruiting party of his forces could be successful in the United States and whether the sending of such a party would be advisable, I desire to inform you that this appears to be not so much a military matter as one involving international relations and would suggest that it be taken up with the State Department.
It is, however, perhaps pertinent to invite your attention to the fact that in general it is a violation of the penal laws of the United States for any person within the territory or jurisdiction of the United States to enlist or hire or retain another person to enlist to go beyond the limits or jurisdiction of the United States with intent to be enlisted or entered in the service of any foreign prince, State, colony, district or people as a soldier or as a marine or seaman. This prohibition does not include the citizens of any country engaged in war with a country with which the United States is at war, but even this provision does not make it legal for citizens of the United States to enlist or go beyond the jurisdiction of the United States to enter the service of a foreign country.
In my opinion these laws would have made it legal for Russian citizens to have enlisted in the United States for service in the Russian army against Germany, but I do not think that enlistments such as General Miller suggests would be considered legal. It is especially clear that the enlistment of American citizens with the purpose he suggests is specially forbidden by law. In writing you this I have consulted the statutes of the United States, but I must beg you to consider my opinion as a semi-official one only and having no diplomatic weight.
Very Sincerely,
- Copy transmitted to the Department of State by the War Department Sept. 24.↩