Letter from Seán Nunan to Lieutenant General Peadar MacMahon (Dublin)
(P.168/4) (Secret) (Copy)

On the 2nd August, a code telegram concerning the purchase of arms in Sweden was received from our Legation in Stockholm. As it was found to be indecipherable, we asked for a repeat, but later one of your officials informed a Third Secretary in our Protocol Division¹ that Colonel Lawlor had cleared the matter on the ‘phone from Stockholm and not to bother further about decoding the wire. The text has now come to hand and I forward it herewith.²

À propos of my telephone conversation with you of the 30th July in regard to a leakage in the Press concerning this matter, I think it unfortunate that Colonel Lawlor should have read the contents of this message on the telephone to Dublin. As the British authorities were by then aware that we had a military mission in Stockholm endeavouring to buy arms, it must be assumed to be within the bounds of possibility that our telephone calls from Stockholm to Dublin – which are, of course, routed through London – would be tapped. Apart from the security aspect, which should normally preclude any possibility of leakage of such particulars as are given in the message, Bofors³ themselves would be entitled to object to the confidential character of the prices quoted to us being endangered.

For our part, we have continued to treat this matter as Top Secret. The file is kept in my office and has not been handled below Assistant Secretary level. On the other hand, it has been brought to my notice that the texts of telegrams of a highly confidential character have been read over the telephone to relatively junior officials here. Fay⁴ spoke to his namesake in your Department on this subject yesterday.

I do not think we are over-stressing the importance of preserving the utmost secrecy in this matter. In any country in the world, the purchase of arms and equipment for its Defence Forces is so treated. Apart from this, we have felt particularly that, in this instance, there was some considerable danger that hostile representations might be made to the Swedish authorities if it became known that we are buying arms there. That we do not exaggerate this danger will be apparent, I think, from p. 777 of the fourth volume of Churchill’s memoirs, which has just appeared.⁵