860H.01/7–344: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Counselor of Mission at Algiers (Chapin)
2140. For Murphy. Your 2264 July 3, midnight. The Department approves of your advice to Merrill.
Since the directive is to be applied only to immediate military operations and is subject to modification the Department would like [Page 1387] the American representative to have the following comments in mind for an early reexamination of the matter.
In general the British objectives, to which our assent is sought, are stated to be the extension of aid to elements prepared to resist the enemy, to achieve Yugoslav national unity and to avoid civil war or involvement in purely internal conflicts or domestic issues. The Department is in complete agreement with these objectives, which represent the policy which this Government has consistently followed.
To achieve these objectives, however, the British propose that (1) the fullest aid should be given to Tito under whose command all forces in Yugoslavia should be united, (2) no support should be furnished Mihailovich forces, (3) support should be given to operations against Chetniks who are definitely collaborating with the enemy or who are reported by the Partisans to be offering resistance to their sabotage operations and (4) on political as well as military grounds Tito’s movement must be extended to and his activities must be promoted in Serbia (your 2244 of July 2, 2 p.m.24). These propositions are presumably based on the Tito-Subasic accord.
Available information indicates that the accord is not a compromise between Yugoslav political groups but essentially an arrangement between the British and Tito, representing an almost unconditional acceptance of the Partisan demands, which Subasic has been prevailed upon to agree to and which have now been put before the King.
The Department believed that the appointment of Subasic and the removal of Mihailovich as Minister of War prepared the way for negotiations from which a reasonable arrangement between the chief Yugoslav elements might be reached. From the rather meager information since received it appears, however, that the exclusion of Serbian interests in the subsequent negotiations and the insistence on giving Tito politically and militarily a free hand for all Yugoslavia have jeopardized the advantages which might have been gained. The reason commonly advanced is Mihailovich’s alleged collaboration with the enemy, on which, in view of the confusing and somewhat contradictory accounts presented, the British themselves do not seem to have made up their mind.
Pending a clarification of the reasons why the Allies should have denied themselves all access to the heart of Yugoslavia, even for intelligence purposes, the Department would not approve a directive setting forth an irrevocable decision to withhold supplies from Serbian forces and giving support to a forcible penetration of Tito into Serbia. We are unable to understand how civil war or involvement [Page 1388] in Yugoslav internal conflicts and domestic issues can be avoided if such open and unconditional support is given one faction against the other, particularly since it appears that the proposed directive is based largely upon information received from or through Partisan sources and that any subsequent modifications thereof or action pursuant thereto would of necessity be determined largely by advices from the same sources. It is felt that to implement the present directive would work an injustice on certain large and deserving groups among the Yugoslav population, whose major offense appears to be their opposition to Partisan domination.
No objection is seen to the provisions of the directive relating to Albania and Hungary. Repeated to Cairo for MacVeagh and to London for Schoenfeld.
- Not printed.↩