765.84/490: Telegram
The Chargé in Italy (Kirk) to the Secretary of State
[Received July 11—2:50 p.m.]
354. Department’s 112, July 10, 6 p.m.47 Associated Press representative here has just informed me that he has heard by telephone from London that according to a message received from Washington by the exchange telephone agency in London the American Government has notified the Italian Government that the United States would regard with “extreme misgivings” any step by Italy which would bring about war in Ethiopia. In reply to a request from the [Page 731] press correspondent for information as to the subject matter of the foregoing report, I told him that this Embassy had received no instructions to deliver any such message to the Italian Government but he gave me to understand that he would inquire again on the matter. In view of the foregoing I shall appreciate notification by the Department in the event that any publicity is given by the Department to the statement made to the Italian Ambassador referred to in the Department’s above-mentioned telegram.
In the course of a conversation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs today in which Abyssinia was discussed I was given no intimation that the Ministry had yet received from Rosso48 the account of his conversation at the State Department yesterday.