95
793.94 Conference/73C
The Secretary of
State to the Honorable Norman H. Davis, United States Delegate to the Conference
at Brussels
[Extract]
WASHINGTON, October 18, 1937.
SIR:
A conference having been called of the
parties signatory to the Nine Power Treaty signed at Washington February 6,
1922, and the Government of the United States having received and accepted an invitation
to participate in this conference, you are to represent the United States.
You will recall that the invitation extended
to this Government by the Belgian Government states that the purpose of the
conference is "to—examine the situation in the Far East and to study
peaceable means of hastening the end of the regrettable conflict which prevails
there".
You will in your participation in this
conference be guided in general by the outline of principles made public on
behalf of this Government by the Secretary of State on July 16, 1937, and the
further statement of policy made by the Secretary of State on August 23, 1937.
You will have constantly in mind the
character and scope of this country's interest in peace in the Pacific and the
Far East as evidenced by the Washington Conference treaties, and especially the
rights and interests of the United States under the Nine Power Treaty; the
substance and purport of the statement of this Government's position made by
the Secretary of State on October 6; also statements relating to foreign policy
made by the President in his address at Chicago on October 5 and in his
broadcast from Washington on October 12. You will bear in mind that the first
objective of the foreign policy of this country is national security, and that
consequently we seek to keep peace and to promote the maintenance of peace;
that we believe in cooperative effort for the preservation of peace by pacific
and practicable means; and that this country has as a signatory of the Pact of
Paris of 1928 renounced war as an instrument of national policy and pledged
itself to resort for settlement of disputes to none but pacific means. You will
bear in mind also that public opinion in the United States has expressed its
emphatic determination that the United States keep out of war.
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It is the hope of this Government that the
conference may be able to achieve results which will contribute toward
permanent stability and peace in the Far East. In the concept of this
Government, the primary function of the conference is to provide a forum for
constructive discussion, to formulate and suggest possible bases of settlement,
and to endeavor to bring the parties together through peaceful negotiation.
Very truly yours,
CORDELL HULL