October 5, 1939
My dear Ambassador:
The enclosures oover our conversation this
morning*
Yours sincerely,
WINSTON S. CHURCHILL
7
We quite understand natural desire of United
States to keep belligerents out of their waters*
We like the Idea of a wide limit of say 300 miles
within which no submarines of any belligerent country
should act.   If America requests all belligerents to
comply, we should Immediately declare that we would
respect your wishes*   General questions of Interna-
tional law would of course remain unprejudiced. More
difficulty arises about surface ships, because if a
raider operates from or takes refuge In the American
zone, we should have to be protected or allowed to pro-
tect ourselves*   We have mentioned several other in-
stances to Mr* Kennedy*   We do not mind how far south
the prohibited zone goes, provided that it is effectively
maintained*   We should have great difficulty in accept-
ing a zone which was only policed by some weak neutral*
But of course if the American navy takes care of it,
that is all right*
Thirdly, we are still not sure whether raider off
Brazil is 3CHEER or HIFFER, but widespread movements
are being made by us to meet either case*   The more
American ships cruising along the South American coast
the better, as you, sir, would no doubt hear what they
saw or did not see*   Haider might then find American
-3-
waters rather crowded, or may anyhow prefer to go on
to sort of trade route, where we are preparing.
We wiflh to help you in every way in keeping the
war out of Americas*