632.6231/261

Memorandum by the Under Secretary of State (Welles)

[Extract]

The German Ambassador called to see me. He handed me a memorandum from his Government27a which he said was in reply to the memorandum given to him by the Department of State last July, which dealt with the subject of German and American trade relations with Brazil. The Ambassador asked if I would study this memorandum myself with “sympathetic consideration” and if I would likewise please make an effort to read not only the lines but between the lines as well. He said this memorandum was the result of his own conversations with his Government in Berlin when he was recently there and was due to his efforts to try to prepare the ground for a more favorable understanding by the German Government of the policy of the United States with regard to a more liberal trade tendency. The Ambassador said that he thought perhaps this memorandum would prepare the way for a further exchange of views between the two Governments, which he hoped would be constructive and lead to a more normal trade relationship between Germany and the rest of the world.

I told the Ambassador that, of course, I would give the memorandum every possible consideration and that the Department would study it attentively. I said I trusted that his Government might in fact be prepared to reconsider its present policy and that if that were the case, we would of course have every disposition to cooperate insofar as circumstances might make that possible.

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S[umner] W[elles]
  1. Infra.