designed to clarify the background of any written understanding that we may hope to reach at the CFM table or elsewhere. For we know now that the words of international agreements mean different things to the Russians than they mean to us; and it is desirable that in this instance we should thresh out some common understanding of what would really be meant by any further written agreements we might arrive at.
The Russians will probably not be prepared to “talk turkey” with us until after the elections. But it would be much easier to talk to them at that time if the discussions did not have to be inaugurated too abruptly and if the ground had been prepared beforehand.
The Russians recently made an interesting approach to Murphy in Berlin, obviously with a view to drawing us out and to testing our interest in talking with them frankly and realistically on the informal plane. I do not think Berlin a desirable place for the pursuit of further discussions of this sort. On the other hand, I do not think that we should give them a complete cold shoulder. We must always be careful not to give discouragement to people in the Kremlin who may urge the desirability of better understanding with us.
I think, in the light of the above, we should give careful attention to the personnel arrangements which we make with relation to the Russian field in the next few months, and that we should play our cards throughout with a view to the possibility of arriving eventually at some sort of a background understanding with the Kremlin. But we must bear in mind that this understanding would necessarily have to be limited and coldly realistic, could not be reduced to paper, and could not be expected to outlast the general international situation which had given rise to it.
I may add that I think such an understanding would have to be restricted pretty much to the European and western Mediterranean area. I doubt that it could be extended to apply to the Middle East and Far East. The situation in these latter areas is too unsettled, the prospects for the future too confusing, the possibilities of one sort or another too vast and unforeseeable, to admit of such discussions. The economic exchanges between Japan and Manchuria might be revived in a guarded and modified form, by some sort of barter arrangement. This is an objective well worth holding in mind, from our standpoint. Rut we should meanwhile have to frame our policies in Japan with a view to creating better bargaining power for such discussions than we now possess.
VII. Far East
My main impression with regard to the position of this Government with regard to the Far East is that we are greatly over-extended
