800.51W89 U.S.S.R./79: Telegram
The Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Bullitt) to the Secretary of State
[Received 10:55 p.m.]
178. Litvinov then brought up an alleged announcement by the Department which is published in this morning’s Moscow papers to the effect that the Government of the United States had refused a bilateral nonaggression agreement proposed by the Soviet Union. He asked me if the statement had been made officially by the Department. I replied that I had no information on the subject. I should be greatly obliged for an early instruction from the Department as to the line I should take when talking with Litvinov and the American newspapermen here with regard to this matter.
Litvinov then said that he understood that the United States had joined England in opposing admission of the Soviet Government to the forthcoming Naval Conference. He said that he had no great desire to have the Soviet Union represented but that France greatly desired the presence of the Soviet Union; that the British and the Japanese were very anxious to have Germany represented but had refrained from making the proposal because of their knowledge of the intention of France to propose the presence of the Soviet Union. I replied that so far as I knew we had taken no position with regard to the final conference; that the British had called the preliminary conference and invited those nations they choose to invite.
Litvinov seemed properly disquieted by the matters referred to in the two paragraphs above and I attempted to fertilize his disquiet by reiterating my fears as to the future of Soviet-American relations. I intimated that our relations with Japan showed improvement and asked him if there had not been a great improvement recently in the relations of the Soviet Union with Japan. He laughed and replied apparently sincerely “the only improvement is that we are not yet at war.”