S E C R E T
 
     The following is a telegram from Mr. Murphy in Algiers to the
 
State Department, dated September 3, 1943.
 
     De Gaulle has raised the issue regarding the control by the Com-
 
mittee over military affairs, following recognition by the Allied
 
Governments and the ensuing clarification of the Committee's position.
 
He has sent to Giraud a very confidential memorandum asking the latter
 
to approve a more clearly defined control of the Committee over the
 
CINC and military activities and the limitation of military power to
 
operations against the enemy and armed force organization. Continuing,
 
the memorandum states that the powers exercised by the ClNC in accordance
 
with French law establishing a "state of siege" should be turned over
 
to the responsible civil administrators and that the Committee should
 
control all secret services, amalgated under one direction.
 
     It is requested that the existence of the memorandum in question
 
not be divulged as it was reported to me in the greatest secrecy.
 
     Further along this line, the possibility of having only one President
 
of the Committee, which in this case would be De Gaulle, and the appoint-
 
ment of a defense commissioner has been suggested. With respect to 
 
military authority, the divergence is being further emphasized by the 
 
insistence of Giraud that alone, he has the authority to speak for the
 
army, and that in his personal capacity the rearmament furnished by the
 
United States of America was given to him.
 
 
The authority to designate civilian administrators in territories
 
of metropolitan France as they are liberated and the question of the 
 
organization and control of resistance movements have been brought to
 
the fore in the discussions of the Committee. The extreme elements of
 
the Gaullist faction have, it seems clear, decided that the time has come
 
 
                    S E C R E T
 
 
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