868.00/4–747
The Acting Secretary of State to the Secretary of War (Patterson)1
My Dear Mr. Secretary: Although the Greek Assistance Program is still under consideration by the Congress, it is considered desirable that a start be made in planning the various activities which this program will include. In order to initiate and coordinate this planning among the various agencies of the Government which will have a relationship to the program, the Department of State proposes to create an Interdepartmental Interim Greek Assistance Committee to be composed of representatives of the following agencies:
- Department of State
- Treasury Department
- War Department
- Navy Department
- Department of Agriculture
- Department of Commerce
- Bureau of the Budget
The Chairman of this Committee will be Mr. Willard Thorp, Assistant Secretary of State for Economic Affairs.
It would be appreciated if you would name a representative from your Department to this Committee and would advise us who this representative will be. The first meeting will be held at 2:30 p. m., Wednesday, April 9, 1947, in Room 474 Old State Building, Seventeenth Street and Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest.2
Sincerely yours,
- Identical letters were sent on April 7 to the Treasury, Navy, Agriculture and Commerce Departments and to the Bureau of the Budget. The Department of Labor was invited to membership on April 14 (868.00/4–1447).↩
- The Interdepartmental Interim Greek Assistance Committee met for the first time on April 9 and discussed the relationship of the various departments to the Greek assistance program, the question of a basic agreement with Greece, various military, agricultural, tax, civil service reform, procurement and import-export programs, and the question of personnel (IGAC M–1, 868.00/4–947). For an account of the Department of State’s coordination of the activities of the various federal agencies in connection with the Greek-Turkish aid program, see Department of State Bulletin, January 9, 1949, p. 55.↩