740.0011 Mutual Guarantee (Locarno)/939
The Ambassador in Germany (Dodd) to the Assistant Secretary of State (Wilson)
[Received November 26.]
Dear Mr. Wilson: I have read your instruction of October 13, No. 877,79 addressed to Mr. Gilbert, with a great deal of interest. We are sending to the Department in the pouch today a careful report bearing on the Belgian problem. From all the evidence which we get, the matter at present is not particularly dangerous. However, I wish to say a word as to the general situation.
You probably know that a great deal of propaganda money is being spent in Belgium to assist that man DeGrelle80 in his operations [Page 155] and that that has been going on for two years. I may add that DeGrelle sent a spokesman to a Party meeting in Stuttgart last winter, and what his representative had to say could not have been very consoling to the Belgian majority. You would find it in a report which was sent to you by the Consul General in Stuttgart.81 The only mistake was that he thought DeGrelle himself was speaking.
As to the real guarantee which the German Ambassador commented upon, one might feel a certain anxiety for the simple reason that Party chiefs here have compelled the Swiss to recognize and allow free activity to the Nazi Party in their country. They did not want to do that, according to their representative here, but fears as to the consequences caused the Government to yield. In so far as Czechoslovakia is concerned, I suspect you have a great deal more information than you obtained from the conversation. The Ambassador, at a dinner where some twenty people were present, asserted before eight or ten of us that there was no question of the right of the Germans to control or annex the peoples of the Danube zone. As that surprised me a little, having known Dieckhoff since I arrived here, I jokingly asked him the question in the presence of our group whether the American Government had the right to annex the whole of Canada, a British representative being present. He did not see the humor of my question, and I had to tell him that a far larger proportion of the population of Canada were from the United States than the proportions in the Danube zone. He held fast to his position, and on another occasion repeated the same remark. When I asked officials of high rank here in the Foreign Office whether the Danube zone should be annexed, they have always indicated that that is their feeling. Having had such conversations, I am a little surprised that my friend Dieckhoff should say to you that the Germans have no thought of annexing Czechoslovakia or even the Sudeten Germans. I hope this really represents a change of policy. If so, it would mean peace in Europe.
I mention these things to you to be considered purely confidential; but I have not yet been convinced that this peace program is going so far, especially after a report to me of the French Ambassador here about a week ago. I hope that our Government, acting through the State Department, may be able to persuade people to recognize one another’s rights; and your conversation seems to indicate that that was what you at least for the moment were doing. I certainly hope that the German Ambassador in Washington realizes now the dangers of doing the things he thought of when he was talking as I have indicated.
Sincerely yours,