501.BB/10–1046
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Chief of the Division of Dependent Area Affairs (Gerig)
| Participants: | Mr. George Middleton, First Secretary, British Embassy |
| SPA—Mr. Hiss; DA—Mr. Gerig |
Mr. Middleton said he had two points to take up with us. First, the United Kingdom Government agreed with our recent proposal23 that it was desirable not to specify by name states as “directly concerned” under Article 79 whose concurrence would be necessary in voting the trusteeship agreements at the Assembly, and that the British would transmit the draft trusteeship terms for Tanganyika, the Cameroons, and Togoland to the Assembly without referring to any other states as being directly concerned. The British Government, he said, felt able to do this in the hope that the United States Government would refrain from making any formal reservation at the General Assembly of its own claim to be a “state directly concerned” in respect of mandated territories. Mr. Middleton added, however, that the British Government was not convinced that other states might not press the Assembly to define and specify certain states as “directly concerned”.24
On this point, Mr. Hiss said that it was our hope that a protracted debate could be avoided and that the United States Delegation, he [Page 639] thought, would merely state that while it considered itself entitled to be a state directly concerned if such states were to be designated, it was prepared, if others also agreed, not to press such a claim. He explained that our waiver, of course, was for this Assembly, and did not necessarily extend to future amendments and alterations of such agreements.
Mr. Middleton then raised his second point, which he said was more difficult and to which the United Kingdom Government attached great importance. At that point he handed us a copy of the official revised text of the trusteeship terms which the British Government was now prepared to submit to the Assembly.25 It contained, he said, substantially all the revisions which the United States experts had pressed in London last June, except on point 10(c) relating to the establishment of general monopolies, on which the experts did not agree. He said that the British Cabinet would have preferred to put forward their original terms, and that it was with some difficulty that the Cabinet was able to agree to a number of our revisions. They decided, however, to put the revised draft forward, provided we could give them some assurance that, apart from Article 10(c), the United States Delegation would support the amended text, and would not press for further revisions.
On this second point, Mr. Hiss said that if the United Kingdom Government wanted a formal commitment of this kind, the Department could not give it because it was not possible to tie the hands of our Delegation completely even before they had seen the text which would be the subject of negotiation at the Assembly. He hoped that the British Government would not press us on this point. He added, however, that it was unlikely that our Delegation would depart from the revisions tentatively agreed upon. Mr. Middleton then said that if we could not give adequate assurance on this point, the British Government might feel that it should fall back on its original text. Mr. Hiss said he felt that would be unfortunate, since it would mean that we, as well as others, would have to introduce a much larger number of amendments which would probably result in failure to reach agreement at this Assembly at all. He hoped that the suggestions previously made to the effect that we did not anticipate any difficulties on points apart from Article 10(c) would be sufficient to give the British Government the assurances it desired.
Mr. Middleton then said he hoped this would be sufficient and that he fully understood the constitutional difficulties of attempting to bind our Delegation. He urged, however, that every effort be made to support the revisions agreed on at the technical level and, further, that the United States Delegation would not support amendments of substance [Page 640] without first consulting with the United Kingdom Delegation.
Mr. Hiss said that he thought, in keeping with our previous practice of consultation, our Delegation would consult with the British Delegation on any amendments of substance which might arise at the Assembly.
At the end of the discussion, Mr. Hiss summarized our position by saying that he thought it would be possible informally to tell London that officials in the Department felt that, except for Article 10(c), the United States Government, through its Delegation, would generally agree with the revised draft in so far as it followed the original revisions agreed on in London, but that it should be explained, nevertheless, that we could not bind the hands of our Delegation to the Assembly.
Mr. Hiss agreed to discuss the matter with the Acting Secretary, and Mr. Gerig agreed to compare the two texts immediately to see if there were substantive differences between the two revisions which might occasion any difficulty.