have been able to establish that the wishes of a large proportion of the States here represented, at least those represented on the SubCommittee, lie in the direction of complete equality of treatment for public and private manufacture. I might state the matter a little more definitely to say that a large number of the delegations regard such equality of treatment as essential. That in itself is, I submit, no mean achievement. Certain delegations, however, are still reluctant to afford a full measure of publicity to State manufacture, and have offered us a limited publicity for value only and by categories. What does this mean? As the delegate of the Netherlands has clearly expressed it, it means that the States will be obliged to furnish in some cases five figures, in some cases four figures and in other cases three figures, according to the types of industry and production which take place within their borders.

We have been urged to accept this as the minimum of agreement, but I fail to see that such a minimum would have beneficial results, and indeed, I believe it might have quite the contrary. To state to our various Governments that we have achieved so low a minimum of agreement is a very easy thing; indeed, we might record agreement merely on the principle that we were agreed to disagree.

It is the profound conviction of my Government that our purpose in this work is to make such contribution as we can to the cause of peace. The cause of peace is not served by offering merely a further cause of bewilderment between the States, a further cause of speculation, a further cause perhaps of distrust; it can be furnished by the elimination of doubt following on full publication which provides an accurate knowledge of the facts all over the world.

We have discussed the achievement of publicity by means of three factors: value, weight and numbers. It was clearly brought out in the Sub-Committee that the choice of value as the only means is the choice of the most elastic, the least definite, the least exact of these measures. It is a true minimum, and I fail to see how any lower minimum could have been suggested.

During the course of the debates we have endeavoured to give to the best of our ability the most complete reasons for our attitude concerning complete publicity, and we have consistently endeavoured to understand why certain of the delegations have failed to agree to a full measure of publicity. We have repeatedly asked for explanations and, speaking for myself, and I believe for a considerable number of our members, I cannot find that any adequate attempt has been made to convince us of this necessity; indeed, as I stated yesterday, I should be very reluctant to have to explain to my Government the reason for this attitude on the part of some of the delegations. I should have frankly to say that I do not know.

I realise that we are representatives of our Governments and that we are all bound by more or less detailed instructions. I realise that we cannot hope here and now to change the opinions which have been expressed; indeed, I have nothing but gratitude for the loyalty and clarity with which the members have expressed their views. Nevertheless, I take this opportunity to urge upon all my colleagues to examine with their Governments in the most candid spirit this question of complete publicity, and to present to them the real conviction of a large number of members here present that a treaty providing for anything so far removed from complete publicity would not be a first step towards the achievement of peace, but a step which would arouse vain hopes and consequent disillusionment.

500.A16/97

The Minister in Switzerland (Wilson) to the Secretary of State No. 673

BERNE, December 13, 1928. [Received January 11, 1929.] SIR: With reference to the Department's instruction No. 354, of November 22, 1928, and other correspondence relative to the third session of the Special Commission for the preparation of a draft convention on the private manufacture of arms, munitions and implements of war, I have the honor to report that the Commission sat at Geneva from December 5 to December 7, inclusive. There are few documents to transmit in reporting on this session for the reason that practically the entire time was taken up with subcommittee debates on which there are no minutes. The report drawn up by the subcommittee was submitted to the full Commission in the final meeting on the evening of December 7th, but the members of the Commission who had not been present in the subcommittee took the position that they were unable to approve the report without more time for consideration. It, therefore, has no juridic existence, but the original report (Document C. F. A. 28)75 will serve to indicate the trend of the debates which took place in the subcommittee. The revised report of the subcommittee will be found in document C. F. A. 28 (1).75

The Chairman, Count Bernstorff, in the first meeting urged a general discussion and was seconded in his appeal by the Rapporteur, M. Guerrero. None of the delegates, however, seemed desirous of entering into a general discussion and the Chairman was therefore constrained to suggest an immediate convocation of the small committee which had functioned during the previous session and which was composed of the delegates of Germany, Salvador, Italy, Belgium, Great Britain, France, the Netherlands, Japan, Spain and the United

"Not printed.

States. Spain did not have a delegate at the last session and Mr. Cobian therefore sat on the subcommittee for the first time.

The Chairman of the subcommittee, M. Guerrero, opened the debate on Article 1 of the Draft Convention (Document A.43.1928.IX) 76 and suggested a discussion of Remark No. 1 thereunder by the Belgian delegation. It was instantly apparent that a situation had arisen which would render it impossible to reach any definite agreement in this session and might perhaps create a situation in which every article of the projected convention might have to be debated over again. The Belgian delegate stated that his Government considered it essential to examine the arrangement of the categories and sub-headings under Article 1 in the light of their unsatisfactory experience in analysing the administrative machinery necessary to carry out the Traffic in Arms Treaty which they expected to ratify at an early date. Sensing a decided opposition on the part of the other members of the subcommittee, the Belgian delegate issued what was in effect an ultimatum, stating that his Government could not sign any convention which was not based on a previous and detailed analysis of the categories of Article 1. At the request of the Chairman, the Belgian delegate submitted his proposal in writing (Document C. F. A. 27)." The French delegate at once took the position that he could not pass upon the terms of Article 5 until he knew exactly what Article 1 was to contain and this statement naturally robbed the subsequent debate of actuality. It was agreed that the delegates present were not prepared, either by instructions or by the presence of technical advisers, to debate the Belgian proposal, and that it would be essential to call a meeting of experts as soon as possible, approximately March 1, 1929, for the purpose of giving consideration to the proposal. Since the substance of the Belgian proposal was not debated, I did not give the American point of view regarding further discussion of the categories of Article 1.

Relative to Remark No. 2, the German delegate declared that he was prepared to withdraw this remark and associate himself with that made by the delegation of the United States.

Discussion then opened on Remark No. 3 which we had inserted relative to aircraft and aircraft engines. As I telegraphed the Department, there was immediate and vigorous opposition to the admission of our proposal, mainly on the part of the military continental Powers and also on that of Japan. It was evident that the alignment on this question was in general the same as the align

70 Not printed. For text of the draft convention under discussion see p. 303. "Not printed.

78 Telegram not printed.

ment in the Preparatory Commission on the question of "potentiel de guerre". My suggestion as to limiting the category to those "destined for the armed forces" met with no more favor, nor were the two formulas even seriously discussed. It was merely stated axiomatically that so far it had been impossible to distinguish between civil and military aviation. (One of the French experts confided to me that they felt that a distinction was possible in America, but that they had no confidence in the results of any distinction for the continental states). The delegate of the Netherlands, in the final plenary meeting, made a formal proposal that experts should discuss Category IV as well as the Belgian proposal, but was voted down. I declared that the title of the proposed convention and the phraseology of the first sentence of Article 1 were such that if the convention were accepted as it stands, Category IV would constitute an undertaking by all States that they considered civil aviation as war material. Since the points of view expressed by the other delegations, with the exception of the British delegate, are already familiar to the Department, I shall confine myself to describing that taken by Mr. Cadogan. He declared that his Government had been preoccupied, as mine had been, with this question of the definition of civil aviation as war material and for this reason they had in the first instance objected to the inclusion of Category IV in Article 1; that they had withdrawn their objection in deference to the wishes of the other nations, but still felt the inadvisability of cataloguing all aircraft as implements of war.

M. Massigli, the French delegate, finally proposed a clause reading as follows:

"Owing to the difficulties in the way of formulating precise rules which would enable a distinction to be made between military and civil aircraft and without prejudice to any definitions which may subsequently be set up of the one and of the other, no distinction will be made between aircraft built for military purposes and aircraft built for or capable of being used for other purposes".

I transmitted this clause in my telegram No. 2, of December 5, 10 p. m.," not with the idea that this phraseology was satisfactory, but with the possibility of working out a satisfactory phraseology in the event that the Department felt that our thesis could be protected in some such way.

If I understand thoroughly the Department's point of view as to this reservation, it is based more on the implications involved than on objections to the publication of the information that would be demanded by the Convention. I understand that our objection is to the inclusion of all aviation as "implements of war" and the resulting

"Not printed.

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possibility of so branding civil aviation. It had seemed to me that there was a possibility that the note drawn up by the French delegate, or one of revised phraseology, might expressly disclaim any prejudging of the question as to "potentiel de guerre", and at the same time furnish a basis on which we could all agree to this category. I therefore stated that I had no idea how my Government would view this proposal, but I would transmit it to Washington. When it became apparent that no possible result could be obtained from the meeting, I stated that I maintained our reserve as it was not worth while in the present circumstances further to examine this proposal.

Article 2. No debate.

Article 3. Mr. Cadogan withdrew the British objection to the inclusion of Category IV in this article.

Remark 2. After a lively debate, it was decided to strike out the words in Paragraph 1: "or of the arms, ammunition and implements the use of which in war is prohibited by international law", and further to eliminate paragraph 3. This did away with the necessity for maintaining Remark No. 2.

Remark 3. I made a brief declaration regarding our position, which the Chairman stated would be brought to the attention of the Council. (It will not be so brought, since the subcommittee's report was not adopted by the Commission).

Article 4. It was decided to eliminate sub-paragraph (c). The remark therefore disappears.

Article 5. The most vigourous debate, as was to be expected, took place on this article. It is needless to summarize this debate, since the Department is thoroughly familiar with the points of view. The representative of the Netherlands and myself made continuous efforts to force the representatives of France, Japan and Italy to explain why they were reluctant to give full publicity, without eliciting any response from them. The Chairman called for a vote on those who advocated the principle of equal treatment for public and private manufacture. Italy was the only State voting against the principle, with the French delegate maintaining that he would not vote until he knew the text of Article 5. It is safe to assume, however, that they will only acquiesce in the principle of equal treatment if a very limited publicity is accorded. This also was the basis of the Japanese position. A re-wording of Article 5 was adopted which is contained in Document C. F. A. 29.80 This phraseology represents a so-called "minimum agreement", but an agreement to which the confirmed advocates of complete publicity, among them ourselves, and the confirmed advocates of a distinction between public and private manufacture, as, for example, Italy, made reservations.

80 Enclosure, p. 329.