740.00/153: Telegram

The Ambassador in France (Bullitt) to the Secretary of State

547–551. I dined last night in Brussels with Ambassador Morris and Van Zeeland.

[Page 675]

In view of Van Zeeland’s forthcoming visit to the United States I shall inform you fully by despatch8 with regard to his remarks—which covered the entire world situation—and confine myself in this telegram to certain points of immediate interest.

1. Van Zeeland said that he and Eden had worked out a new project for a western pact. He asked that this be kept most secret. He said that he and Eden had agreed that any revival of the Locarno Pact9 was impossible but they believed it might be possible if considered to establish a “plurilateral non-aggression pact” to include Germany, France, England, Belgium, and perhaps Italy. If this attempt should fail he would try to make a non-aggression pact with Germany on behalf of Belgium alone.

2. With regard to his mission to the United States, he said that he would refuse to make any statement whatsoever until he had felt out the situation completely both in Europe and in the United States. He did not expect to be able to begin to draw any conclusions for perhaps 3 months and he was not sure that at the end of that time he would have anything highly important to offer. It was obvious that any serious attempt to heal the world’s commercial and economic problems must entail settlement of financial, disarmament, and political problems as well. His task therefore was to search the ground for a new world settlement.

He described in great detail his conversations with Schacht and asserted that Schacht had said to him that Germany was reaching the end of her tether economically, that the system of economic autarchy in Germany had given good results up to the present time but could not be carried much further.

Schacht had then stated that it was absolutely essential that Germany should have colonies. Van Zeeland said that he had argued with Schacht that no colonies that Germany conceivably could get would solve the German economic problem but that Schacht had continued to argue that colonies from which Germany could obtain colonial products for German marks were essential.

Van Zeeland said that Schacht was opposed to any general economic conference but believed that some result might be reached if one qualified representative from each of the leading powers should meet in a small conference. Van Zeeland said that he had replied that he was glad to have the suggestion but had established as a principle that he would not comment on any suggestion until he was familiar with the opinions of all the leading governments of the western world.

[Page 676]

3. With regard to the position of England, Van Zeeland said that for the first time within his knowledge the British had today an entirely definite and strong line of policy. They would continue to rearm and they would continue to maintain the tariff walls around their empire unless they felt certain that the changing of these policies would give them peace. He said categorically several times that the British were not interested in the reduction of barriers to international trade and that they would accept such reduction only as a part of a global settlement which they felt certain would give them peace. He went on to say that he believed that during the next few years the British would very nearly control the trend of international affairs; they were increasing in strength daily and were fully disposed to use the strong paw of the lion in accordance with their old traditions.

I suggested to him that if there were no one in the British Cabinet who sincerely and intensely desired to restore the economic life of the world there was not much chance that his mission would achieve success.

He said that he felt the British might come in at the end and support his efforts strongly if he could find sufficient previous support from other nations.

4. Van Zeeland said that he regarded the full cooperation of the United States as essential and asked me a series of questions with regard to the attitude of the United States. I replied to him in exact accordance with your remarks to me in our recent conversations in Washington, emphasizing the fact that while we would be most eager to cooperate in any efforts to reduce the barriers to international commerce and to achieve an accord for limitation of armaments we could not take any political commitments and that it was almost inconceivable that European countries should be allowed to float loans in the United States. I made these latter two statements because he had asked me if there might be a possibility that the United States would join the League of Nations provided Article Sixteen should be re-defined and because he had asked me if there were not a possibility that the Johnson Act10 might be repealed. Van Zeeland said that he hoped he could have utterly frank conversations with you and the President when he reached Washington. I told him I was certain that this was what you both desired.

5. Van Zeeland admitted that he thought that Belgium’s new status in the international picture would inconvenience greatly the ability of France to come to the aid of Poland, Czechoslovakia, Austria, or any other state of Central Europe. He said, however, that he considered [Page 677] it most important that England had changed her attitude toward the status quo in Central Europe. For example Eden recently had assured Beneš that Great Britain was not disinterested in the fate of Czechoslovakia. (For your confidential information, Delbos has made the same statement to me.) Van Zeeland said that Eden had assured him in the most categorical manner that Great Britain was now prepared to push to the full her support of the League of Nations and had intimated that under the aegis of the League of Nations Great Britain might intervene in case Czechoslovakia should be attacked by Germany. He felt that this new attitude on the part of the British Government would go far to counterbalance the argument of France’s offensive position against Germany caused by the present policy of Belgium.

He went on to say that there was at the present time the most absolute accord which could be imagined between the British, French and Belgian Governments and added in reply to a question that the leader of this trio who called the tune to which the others danced was unquestionably the British Government.

6. Van Zeeland said that he regarded it as a possibility that Germany shortly would issue a statement guaranteeing Belgium but this might well be preceded by the negotiation of the non-aggression pact referred to in the paragraph numbered 1 of this message.

7. Van Zeeland was extremely apprehensive with regard to the financial situation in France, saying that he could not see how the French could avoid a financial crash in June or July and that another devaluation of the franc seemed inevitable.

Bullitt
  1. Not found in Department files.
  2. Treaty of Mutual Guaranty between Germany, Belgium, France, Great Britain, and Italy, signed October 16, 1925; for texts, see League of Nations Treaty Series, vol. liv, pp. 289–363.
  3. Approved April 13, 1934; 48 Stat. 574; see Foreign Relations, 1934, vol. i, pp. 525 ff.