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they apparently do not wish to break with us, we should be 
      glad to extract what we can from this situation. We think it 
      well to pursue this exchange of views with the Vichy Government 
      in the hope that they will find it to their interests to reach 
      an accommodation with us. We realize that they are under the 
      German heel and they cannot be regarded as free agents in anything 
      that they do. We can hardly expect to receive binding assurances 
      in writing from them which would not be approved by the Germans 
      and they have so far given us little ground for confidence in 
      any oral assurances they may give us in the circumstances but 
      there is no other basis on which we can proceed, given the position 
      in which they find themselves. The one safeguard we have is that 
      if they go back on their undertakings, we can regard any arrangement 
      we make with them as void and withdraw any advantage we have 
      accorded to them.