740.00119 EW/3–845: Telegram
The Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Harriman) to the Secretary of State
[Received March 9—1 a.m.]
681. Information contained in Department’s 511 March 5, midnight,28 can hardly be characterized as a peace feeler in the sense contemplated at the Moscow Conference29 and I believe that our treating it as such would be offensive to the Soviets and be misinterpreted. I propose, therefore, to take no action unless I receive further instructions.30
- Not printed; this telegram informed Mr. Harriman of the German proposals supra and instructed him to communicate them to the Soviet Government (740.00119 EW/3–545).↩
- In the Declaration of Four Nations on General Security, October 30, 1943, the Governments of the United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, and China declared their intention to act together in all measures relating to the surrender and disarmament of a common enemy. For text and related correspondence on the Tripartite Conference in Moscow, October 18–November 1, 1943, see Foreign Relations, 1943, vol. i, pp. 513 ff.↩
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Telegram 544, March 9, 9 p.m., to Moscow, not printed, instructed Mr. Harriman: “Dept considers that the report referred to in your 681, March 8, midnight, should be brought to the attention of the Soviet Government in whatever informal manner you consider best in order that there may be no misunderstanding should the Soviet Government itself receive a different version of the report.” (740.00119 EW/3–845)
In telegram 812, March 19, 6 p.m., from Moscow, Mr. Harriman reported that on March 13 he had told Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov, People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union, that “the Department had heard a story about a conversation of a Dr. Hesse in Stockholm. I told him that we could not dignify this story as a peace feeler but that it might be a matter of general interest. I then gave him the information contained in the Department’s 511, March 5, midnight, without going into the details of the terms mentioned”. (740.00119 EW/3–1945)
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