550.S1 Washington/359
Memorandum by the Chairman of the American Delegation (Davis) of a Conversation With the President of the French Council of Ministers (Daladier)19
Mr. Davis began by telling M. Daladier that he had spent a few days in England at the invitation of Mr. MacDonald, principally to discuss the arrangements for the forthcoming Economic Conference of which Mr. MacDonald was the chairman; that nothing had as yet been decided on that score and that they had touched rather lightly on the questions of Disarmament and the Four Power Pact,20 as these two latter things were at the present inextricably involved one with the other.
The Prime Minister intervened to say that he thought that the Mussolini Pact had made Disarmament infinitely more difficult due to the fact that it distinctly provided for the rearmament of Germany which was a thing he could not possibly permit or subscribe to in any form. He said that he had always been in favor of strong measures of disarmament and that the sooner these were obtained from all the Powers the better. However, he felt that the level should be obtained by the downward grading of other Powers and not by an upward grading by Germany. He said that, had he been in power when Brüning21 had been in power in Germany, he might have obtained something along these lines, but faced with Hitler and hitlerism, the whole problem was difficult.
Mr. Davis said that this was of course understandable; that there was no question as to the mistake that had been made in not taking advantage of the Brüning regime in Germany for a greater rapprochement, particularly on the question of armaments, but that at present it was not a matter of contemplating the mistakes of the past, but of looking forward to what could be done in the future, and in particular of deciding on an immediate and drastic first stage that would encourage the belief that further and realistic stages of disarmament would follow.
M. Daladier said that of course it must not be forgotten that France had made some progress on disarmament on its own volition as compared to some years ago, but he agreed that some drastic step as part of a program of immediate revision was essential.
The Prime Minister said that he had recent news from Germany indicating that one of the greatest difficulties was that Hitler did not have much idea of either what he was doing or what he wanted [Page 83] to do and seemed to be considerably lost as head of the government instead of head of an opposition. As recently as two days ago, M. Daladier had been informed that Hitler even contemplated offering Brüning the portfolio of Foreign Affairs in view of the disturbances in Germany and the foreign reaction to the Jewish persecution, and Mr. Davis said that this tallied to some extent with the information which he had with regard to the protests of Von Neurath on this subject. Mr. Davis and the Prime Minister agreed as to the reasonable character of Von Neurath and his efforts to bring about a reasonable frame of mind in the government, and Mr. Davis said confidentially that he had decided to visit Berlin at the end of the week partly because after he had tentatively arranged last December to go at Neurath’s invitation he was at the last moment unable to do so. He had told Von Neurath that on his return he would go to Berlin and had just received word from Neurath that he would be welcome now. The Prime Minister responded that he thought it an excellent idea and a good moment to do so, especially as under the circumstances it could not be interpreted in any way as an endorsement of Hitler but rather as an endorsement of disarmament.
With reference to the Italian project, Mr. Davis said that France should be grateful that the Mussolini Four Power idea was distinctly an indication that he did not wish to tie himself up alone with Hitler. M. Daladier said that this idea would bear considerable reflection since he felt that the diplomacy of Machiavelli was still the rule in Italy, but on the whole he agreed with Mr. Davis’ deduction and that assuredly the Anschluss, for example, offered a far greater menace to Italy than it did to France and that no doubt that was understood. Mr. Davis said that for these very reasons this seemed the moment when Italian friendship should be sought and obtained by France, since it would be done at no great sacrifice at the present moment in view of the menace Hitlerism might be thought to constitute for Italy.
Pursuing this question of French relations with other countries at the moment, Mr. Davis said that if Germany should ever calm down and be intelligent for six months at a time, France would find itself in a difficult position to justify its great armaments; that thus far German stupidity had always been counted upon to obtain France friends in moments of necessity.
The Prime Minister agreed laughingly to this and said that it had become a habit of France to count on Germany’s clumsy aberrations to win back her friends when she had become isolated.
Mr. Davis said that he did not think that this should be counted on forever and that the thing to study was what real step could be taken that could do some good to the whole world in the line of disarmament.
[Page 84]He said that he wanted to go into these matters in some detail and more profoundly with the Prime Minister at his convenience. The Prime Minister then asked Mr. Davis plans and on learning that he would probably pass through Paris next week, said that he was most anxious for an opportunity for such discussion and this would give good chance as Parliament would rise shortly for its Easter vacation which would leave him more free.
Mr. Davis said that it was of the greatest importance that the three great democracies,—France, England and the United States, should in the first place establish some harmony among themselves before April 25th when the Disarmament Conference was due to reconvene and that any common ground that could be found among these three should likewise be made to include Italy and Germany.
In closing Mr. Davis said that he had been most happy to make the acquaintance of M. Daladier of whom he had heard so many favorable things from Mr. MacDonald and Mr. Gibson.
- Paris, April 5, 12:45 p.m., at the Ministry of War; James Theodore Marriner and Allen W. Dulles were also present. The memorandum was transmitted to the Department under covering letter of April 13, 1933; received April 22.↩
- For correspondence relating to the Four Power Pact, see pp. 396 ff.↩
- German Chancelor, 1930–32; leader of the German Center Party.↩