William Cox Redfield to Woodrow Wilson

PERSONAL AND
CONFIDENTIAL.

My dear Mr. President
It has happened heretofore that I have been able to show the Russian Charge d'Affaires, Mr. Onou, some small personal courtesies and therefore he seems to feel on very friendly terms. In a talk this afternoon at my office he has made certain suggestions that I think you should know.
There are three entrances into Russia.
1 – Port Romanoff. The new railroad connecting this ice-free port with the Russian railroad system is bad, laid in part on marshes and cannot be depended upon for heavy transportation.
2 – Archangel, now in good condition to handle large quantities of freight with new and good railroad connections but open only five months yearly.
3 – The Trans-Siberian railway, now, Mr. Onou says, in bad shape with perhaps a half million tons material waiting at Vladivostock for carriage.Mr. Onou points out that therefore but one port is really available and that for but five months. There is in this country waiting to go forward 190,000 tons of material and there will come forward from existing contracts 120,000 tons per month. The problem is to deliver this material to Archangel during the short five months period while that port is open. Otherwise it may not arrive for nearly or quite a year.
Mr. Onou suggests that the time limit makes transit to Archangel one of peculiar urgency. Also that the way in which we can best help Russia quickly (now that the Root and the Railway Commissions have gone) is to do all we can to meet this transit problem in the time available. There seems much force in what he says.
I have made an appointment for Mr. Denman to meet Mr. Onou at my office Monday and said to Mr. Onou that he should make the case plain to Mr. Lansing as soon as he could. This he said he would do. I know how pressing these transportation problems are but Mr. Onou feels, possibly with some force, that the urgent needs in Western Europe and our own war requirements may obscure the necessities of Russia, and that his people would be strengthened in guiding their own government over troubled seas by the knowledge that we were caring particularly for their transportation needs as suggested.