Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1944, General, Volume I

740.00116 E.W./8–2444

The Department of State to the British Embassy ⁵

Memorandum

On or about July 31, 1943 the British, Soviet and United States representatives in a number of neutral states made representations to the governments to which they were accredited requesting that Axis leaders and their henchmen not be admitted into those countries.⁶

In view of the rapid progress of Allied forces in France, the United States Government deemed it advisable to telegraph urgently to the American Minister at Bern on August 23, 1944,⁷ to make renewed representations to the Swiss Government concerning this matter. A paraphrase of the Secretary of State’s instruction to the Minister at Bern is attached for the confidential information of the British Government.

Occasion was also taken to send substantially similar instructions to the American Ambassadors in Madrid and Lisbon and the American Minister in Stockholm.⁸ It is not the present intention of the United States Government to give any publicity to this matter but the substance of the instructions to the American Minister at Bern is also being communicated in confidence to the Soviet Government and may likewise be communicated in confidence to the governments of other United Nations.

Washington , August 24, 1944.

5. The same, mutatis mutandis, on the same date, to the Soviet Embassy.
6. See Foreign Relations, 1943, vol. i, pp. 460–463, passim.
7. No. 2905, supra.
8. See footnote 2, p. 1410.