810.74/899
The Ambassador in Argentina (Armour) to the Secretary of State
[Received February 1.]
Sir: With reference to the Department’s telegram no. 14, of January 4, 8 p.m. and the Embassy’s telegrams nos. 140, of January 19, 8 p.m., 141 of January 19, 9 p.m. and 153 of January 20, 8 p.m.,30 I have the honor to report that the substance of the information contained in the Department’s telegram above mentioned was incorporated into an Aide-Mémoire, dated January 14, as soon as it was learned that similar representations were to be made by the British Embassy here.
On January 15 I called on Dr. Gache, Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and handed him the Aide-Mémoire, a copy of which is forwarded herewith in both English and Spanish.31 He said he would like to say to me, not as Under Secretary but rather as “Dr. Gache, a man in the street”, that perhaps it might have been a more effective procedure for us to have given these instructions to the company without previously consulting or informing the Foreign Office. My reply was that it seemed logical that the company would get in touch with the Argentine Government before taking final action, and I felt sure my Government would wish to be on record as having informed the Argentine Government of the action we proposed to take, particularly as we hoped that we could count on their support, at least to the extent of not making it impossible for Transradio to take the action requested.
I said that our hope was based not only upon the fact that the action envisaged was in accordance with the Rio resolutions signed by the Argentine Government, but I felt sure he must agree that it was asking too much of a company, with approximately half of its capital American and British, to send messages which led to the sinking of our ships, with attendant loss of life. In fact, I felt sure that the American [Page 517] shareholders, in receiving their dividends, would feel that they virtually were accepting “blood money” so long as such a situation existed. I added that in my opinion the action proposed by us might be of assistance to the Argentine Government. The Minister for Foreign Affairs had argued that missions having official representatives here could not be deprived completely of the use of cipher, but if the companies themselves took the action, would not the Government’s position then be a mere acceptance of the decision taken by the companies?
Dr. Gache did not vouchsafe any opinion as to what his Government’s position would be, but admitted that the situation was a most illogical one. He said he would of course take up the matter with his Minister, who was going out of town that night.
The Under Secretary also informed me that Mr. Hadow, the British Chargé d’Affaires, had just preceded me and had delivered a similar communication. A copy of the Spanish text of the British Aide-Mémoire, furnished by Mr. Hadow, is forwarded herewith, as well as an English translation.32
I had no more than returned to my office when Dr. Gache telephoned to say that he had spoken with the Minister, and he wished to reiterate his feeling that he believed it inadvisable for us to present this matter officially, and that instead we should take it up with the company direct without having anything on record at the Foreign Office.
I told Dr. Gache that it was unlikely that the company would agree to take the action without some intimation of what the Government’s attitude would be, and asked him whether the Foreign Minister would permit me to tell representatives of American interests in Transradio that the Argentine Government would interpose no objection to the company’s taking the action requested, and that if they wished confirmation of this they could approach the Foreign Office. Dr. Gache emphatically said that he knew the Foreign Minister would not agree to any such procedure. I replied that in this case I could see no alternative other than for our Aide-Mémoire to stand.
Dr. Gache then asked if I would object if he kept the Aide-Mémoire on his desk without making it a matter of official record until the return to Buenos Aires of the Foreign Minister, at which time I might discuss the subject with the latter. Inasmuch as the same request was made concerning the British representation, both Mr. Hadow and I told Dr. Gache that we saw no objection, but I added that if the Foreign Minister still held to his opinion, my Aide-Mémoire would have to be considered retroactively.
On the afternoon of January 15, the day of my interview with Dr. Gache, an official of Transradio was called to the office of Sr. Cosentino, [Page 518] Chief of Radiocommunications in the Posts & Telegraphs Department, and cautioned against taking any action concerning suppression of all code traffic without prior approval of the Argentine Government. Even before this warning, however, it was quite apparent that the local Transradio board would have taken no such action without official approval.
Under date of January 19, the Foreign Office replied to my Aide-Mémoire with its memorandum, a Spanish copy of which is forwarded herewith. An English translation was given in the Embassy’s telegram No. 140 of January 19, 8 p.m. The Foreign Office reply was accompanied by word from Dr. Gache that the Minister would discuss it with me the following day—January 20.
I opened the conversation by calling the Minister’s attention to the fact that the wording of his memorandum would indicate that the communication which I had left with the Under Secretary had not been clearly understood, for his reply showed that they were under the impression that our Government proposed to send instructions to the company direct, whereas my Aide-Mémoire had clearly indicated that before taking this measure we hoped to secure the agreement of the Argentine Government. On re-reading my Aide-Mémoire, the Minister admitted that this nuance had escaped him. I then stated that I was surprised at the language used in the second paragraph of the Foreign Office memorandum; that so far as I was aware, there had never been any occasion for the Argentine Government to set forth its views to us regarding interference by Foreign governments in companies incorporated under Argentine law. The Minister said that he realized that this was probably true but that the statement I referred to was merely a general reiteration of the traditional Argentine policy. I said that as he probably knew, 50 percent of the capital of the company under discussion—Transradio—was American and British and that he must surely agree that to ask this company to continue to send messages, undoubtedly containing information leading to the sinking of our ships, ran counter to every instinct of decency and humanity. I told him, as I had already told Dr. Gache, that I felt sure American shareholders receiving dividends from the Argentine company under such circumstances would feel that they were accepting “blood money”. Furthermore, I had understood him to say some weeks ago, in discussing the Government’s amended decree permitting 100 words per diem in code to the Axis countries, that if proof were forthcoming that these Embassies were abusing this privilege steps would be taken to prohibit all messages in code. Surely, since that conversation, such evidence had been forthcoming; in fact, the Foreign Office’s own communiqué published in the press [Page 519] on January 12 last, setting forth the facts connected with Captain Niebuhr’s33 recall, clearly admitted the latter’s complicity as an official member of the German Embassy. The Minister interrupted me to say that he felt I was mistaken: that they had merely admitted the impropriety of Niebuhr’s action in identifying himself with certain espionage activities but that this did not necessarily include complicity in sending messages in code which had to do with the sinking of United Nation shipping. Proof of this, or that information sent by Axis agents had resulted in sinking of United Nations ships was, he insisted, still lacking, as stated in the last paragraph of his memorandum.
I asked the Minister whether he did not feel that the many intercepted messages which we had officially brought to his Government’s attention in our memoranda together with copies of telegrams regarding allied shipping which they had themselves found in the raids on Axis offices that followed, did not constitute such proof. He still attempted to maintain his point that direct connection between telegrams sent and the sinking of allied ships had not been established and told me that if we could furnish such proof they would be glad to have it. He asked particularly that our Government furnish them, if possible, with deciphered copies of code messages sent by the German Embassy since the 100 word regulations went into effect. If these were to show that the German Embassy was continuing to send messages reporting movements of ships, etc., his Government would, of course, then be in a position to act.
In the meantime, he said, the Government would issue the strictest instructions to the interventors now stationed in the radio offices that they should satisfy themselves as to the innocuous nature of the contents of code messages emanating from the Axis Embassies. To my question as to how this could be accomplished, he made the incredible reply that the officers in question could insist that the Embassies inform them what was in the messages, or give them a reading of them.
The Minister then went on to stress again the point that use of the code was a right inherent in diplomatic representation and that his Government could not deprive Axis missions of all use of the code without virtually isolating them. I replied that even admitting, for the sake of argument, the right of the Axis representatives to invoke such privileges after the abuse they had already made of this country’s hospitality, this privilege was not a recently acquired one: it existed, if at all, at the time he had signed on behalf of his Government at Rio Resolution 4034 unanimously adopted by the 21 republics. It [Page 520] seemed to me that the time to have raised this point was before agreeing to the Resolution—not now, a year later. I then read him the text of the Resolution, which I had with me. The Minister, obviously on the defensive, replied that the Resolution was merely a “recommendation”. Furthermore, that so many resolutions had been presented at Rio—five or six a day—that there had been no time properly to study them and it would be unreasonable to take them too seriously or, at any rate, insist upon a too literal interpretation of them.
This astounding statement, surpassing even anything I had already come to expect from Dr. Ruiz Guiñazú, was too much. I told him that it was evident that no useful purpose could be accomplished by continuing the conversation, and departed.
I was informed later, by one of the American correspondents who attended the press conference of the Minister, called for the purpose of discussing Chile’s break in relations with the Axis, that to a question by one of the correspondents as to the reason for my interview with him, the Minister stated with evident annoyance: “The same old question—telecommunications”, adding hastily, “But that is not for publication”. I understand that the correspondent of the New York Herald Tribune, my informant, considered this caution as applying only to local publication and incorporated it in a despatch to his paper.
As mentioned in the Embassy’s telegram no. 141 of January 19, 9 p.m., the Argentine Government’s reply to the British Aide-Mémoire of January 15 was similar to that received by us. Mr. Hadow also took issue with the Argentine reply, but as arrangements were not made for him to see the Foreign Minister, he presented his points in a personal letter to the Minister, a translation of which is forwarded herewith.37
Respectfully yours,