740.00119 EW/12–2744: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Harriman)
2922. ReEmbs 5034 December 27, 9 p.m. The Department agrees to the change proposed by Molotov in the preamble. We still prefer the wording of the Bulgarian armistice as a model for Article I but would accept Molotov’s proposed text.
[Page 951]Article III, as summarized in your 3933 October 13 contains only one sentence; your reference to the deletion of a second paragraph is therefore not understood. The text of the new Article III proposed by Molotov, as it appears in a telegram from Clark Kerr to Lord Halifax99 made available to us by the British Embassy, is acceptable to the Department. This text is as follows: “Hungary undertakes to evacuate all Hungarian troops and officials from the territory of Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and Rumania occupied by her within the limits of the Hungarian frontiers existing on December 31, 1937”.
On Article XIII and Article XIX you are already in possession of the Department’s views. We welcome the use of Article XVIII of the Bulgarian armistice as a model for Article XIX of the Hungarian terms, but would like to see added a sentence covering the second part of the armistice period. As was indicated in Department’s 2498 October 21, you should support this view strongly but should not make a decisive issue of it.
The Department agrees to the inclusion of an additional article stating that the signatories regard as null and void the agreements by which Hungary acquired territory from neighboring states.
Molotov’s proposal that the Czechoslovak and Yugoslav representatives be informed of the terms after agreement has been reached by the three principal Allies is entirely acceptable to the Department. We hope that the Czechoslovak and Yugoslav Governments will be given time to comment on the terms before they are handed to the Hungarians.
Although it seems reasonable to us that the matter of the treatment of refugees and displaced persons should be included in the armistice, we have no real objection to its being issued instead in a separate declaration, and are willing that this matter be worked out by you with the British and Soviet representatives.
- British Ambassador in the United States.↩