840.48/3326a: Telegram

The Secretary of State to the Chargé in the United Kingdom (Johnson)

339. On behalf of the American Red Cross please transmit the following statement to the Ministry of Economic Warfare

“The Chargé d’Affaires of the German Embassy in Washington has transmitted to the American Red Cross under instruction from his government definite proposals for relief work in the Government General for the occupied Polish territories, the terms of which are quoted as follows:

‘The German Government agrees to the relief work among the civil population in the Government General which the American Red Cross is carrying out or intends to carry out. The German Government is prepared to grant transportation facilities and exemption from customs duty for the shipments imported by the American Red Cross for relief purposes. The German Government will grant, upon special application, permission for a qualified representative of the American Red Cross to enter the territory of the Government General in order to receive the American shipments for Polish relief, to regulate their distribution in agreement with the German Red Cross and to observe this distribution. It is understood that these American shipments are being forwarded to the civil population of the Government General exclusively and that they will at no time be at the disposal of or claimed by the German authorities.’

The American Red Cross has accepted the statement of the German Government and will proceed immediately with the distribution of relief supplies received at Cracow or in transit. We trust that the written guarantees above referred to, which have been accepted by the American Red Cross as the assurance required for its continued effort to provide a measure of relief of the distress in Poland, likewise will be accepted by the British Ministry of Economic Warfare as meeting its requirements.

The American Red Cross on its part undertakes full responsibility for the regulation and observation by its representatives of the receipt and distribution of supplies in Poland, and will immediately discontinue the shipment of supplies whenever it appears that the agreement of the German Government has not been observed.

I trust that the assurances which are herein given will be acceptable to the Ministry of Economic Warfare and that favorable consideration will be given to our request for the further passage through the blockade of American Red Cross supplies consigned for relief in Poland.

The full text of the letter from the German Chargé d’Affaires has been transmitted today to the British Ambassador for his information. Norman Davis 312.”11

Mr. Davis will greatly appreciate any assistance which you can appropriately render in obtaining favorable action on the request of the Red Cross.

Hull
  1. In a letter of February 24, 1940, addressed directly to the German Chargé, Mr. Davis accepted the proposals of the German Government.