851.01/2204: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Consul General at Algiers (Wiley)
Washington, June 7,
1943—5 p.m.
1084. For Murphy. Your 1037, June 4, 4 p.m. In the conversation with General Bethouart the Under Secretary informed him of the President’s invitation to General Giraud to visit this country and that the message was not only to express the President’s warm desire to meet with General Giraud here but also to assure him that the bases laid down in Casablanca conversations were in no way changed.
- Secondly, it was made clear to General Bethouart that there was no tradition in this country which would prevent the Commander in Chief of the Army from holding such a further position as, for instance, the President or alternating President of the proposed National Committee of Liberation.
- Third, in the view of this Government the National Committee of Liberation would be responsible as trustees for all French interests and territories outside of metropolitan France but was not to be or become the provisional Government of France.
- Four. The British were in general agreement with the last two points.
- Five. The people of metropolitan France must be free to work out their own future free from outside coercion either foreign or French.
- Six. The United States Government regarded the French armies as military allies and General Bethouart could be assured this Government would make every effort to fulfill our military commitments.
- Seven. This country very much desired immediate union between all French authorities outside of metropolitan France and that this union might assist in every way possible in the war against the Axis but no union could be looked on with favor that in any way threatened either to become an organization intended to further personal ambitions or to impair the military effort of the allied nations.
Hull