870.811/220: Telegram
The Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Steinhardt) to the Secretary of State
[Received November 4—3:30 p.m.]
1479. An announcement of the Commissariat for Foreign Affairs published in the Soviet press this morning states that on October 29th the British Ambassador in Moscow transmitted a note to the People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs in which the British Government protested against the decision of the Soviet Government concerning the creation of a new Danube Commission and the participation of representatives of the Soviet Government in the conversations in Budapest [Bucharest?] with representatives of Germany, Italy and Rumania. The announcement states that in its note the British Government declared that since it considered the actions of the Soviet Government as a violation of neutrality the British Government could not recognize any agreements which might violate existing treaties and that it must reserve all its rights in the matter. The announcement continues that on November 2nd the Assistant Commissar for Foreign Affairs Vyshinski received the British Ambassador and handed him in the name of the Soviet Government a note
“in which the Government of the Soviet Union declares that it is forced to recognize as incorrect the assertion of the British Government to the effect that the recognition by the Soviet Government of the necessity of creating a new Danube Commission and the participation of the Soviet Union in the conversations with Bucharest constitute a violation of neutrality. The formation of a Danube Commission with the participation of the Soviet Union and also of the states bordering on the Danube or close to the Danube constitutes the reestablishment of justice which was violated by the Versailles40 and other treaties by virtue of which the Soviet Union was eliminated from the composition of not only the International but also of the European Danube Commissions.41
The Danube Commission must naturally be composed of the representatives of the states bordering on the Danube or closely connected with the Danube or utilizing the Danube as a channel for trade (for example Italy).
It is understandable that Great Britain separated from the Danube by thousands of kilometers cannot be counted among the number of such states. It is also understandable that the question of the composition of the Danube Commission has no relation whatsoever to the [Page 627] question of neutrality. In view of the foregoing the Soviet Government is unable to entertain the protest declared by the British Government in its note of October 29th.”
- Treaty of Peace between the Allied and Associated Powers and Germany, signed at Versailles on June 28, 1919; for text, see Foreign Relations, The Paris Peace Conference, 1919, vol. xiii, p. 57.↩
- See footnotes 93 and 94, pp. 500 and 501, respectively.↩