Foreign Relations of the United States, 1951, Korea and China, Volume VII, Part 1

330/6–2951: Telegram

The United States Deputy Representative at the United Nations (Gross) to the Secretary of State

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New York, June 29, 1951—2:39 p. m.

Unmis 47. For Hickerson, UNA from Gross, USUN re conversation at the USSR SC dinner.¹ When I arrived, I greeted Malik with formality. Shortly afterward he came up to me and expressed regret that he had not been able to see me during the past two days. With great particularity he explained the circumstances of his illness and said he had been under doctor’s orders to stay in bed until Saturday.² He said he had violated his orders by attending his dinner.

He proceeded to say he had received word today about Gromyko’s talk with Kirk, in which former had explained certain points raised by our Ambassador.

I said I had a report about this, and asked Malik if there was anything he would like to add. He replied he thought Gromyko had covered subject. He added: “We can hope for peace.”

Malik then volunteered the comment that he was “very sorry about the breakdown of the conference in Paris”.³ He said the Atlantic Pact was the great problem between our two countries. He described it as obviously an aggressive plan directed against the Soviet Union.

I replied that he had often said this to me but that he must be perfectly well aware the Atlantic Pact was concluded only because Soviet policies made necessary a defensive alliance to protect its members against the threat of aggression. I said that it was my own personal experience that the U.S. Senate would not have ratified the treaty unless they had been convinced by several years of experience after the war that the Soviet Union was intent upon aggression. Their maintenance of huge armies and policy of the Iron Curtain, building up armies in Eastern Europe and above all aggression in Korea have created deep fears of their intentions. For us, the Atlantic Pact was the result of tension created by the Soviet Union and we did not agree that it could be considered as a cause of tension.

Malik replied, “I would hope you would invite us to participate in the Atlantic Pact.” I pretended not to understand him. He repeated these quoted words without apparent sarcasm or facetiousness,

I said we had invited them to join the Marshall Plan but they had refused to do so and even had made Czech change her mind. Malik then went into a ritualistic song and dance about the “political conditions” we had attached to the Marshall Plan. He insisted with emphasis that the Soviet Union had at first been willing to join the Marshall Plan while it seemed to be a fair economic program with “mutual trade arrangements”, but when they saw we were “trying to dominate West-tern Europe” with our economic power they, of course, would have nothing to do with it. I challenged his comments.

Returning to subject of the Atlantic Pact, Malik said we were frightened by our own propaganda. Although we talked about large Russian armies, we never talk about our own huge navy, air force and “atom bomb stockpile”. We say we are afraid of the Soviet Union but we keep bases near her borders. On other hand, the Soviet Union has no bases near our frontiers. He was firmly convinced that we wanted the Atlantic Pact in order to get bases in Europe, and this proved our aggressive intentions. He could not understand why we were “not willing to co-exist”. Instead of trying to reach an agreement with Soviet Union, we kept talking about their building up “small armies in small countries.” At same time we ourselves were making big armaments to add to our navy, air force and atom-bomb stockpile. He was “formly [firmly?] convinced” that the American people did not approve of this course.

They did not want war any more than the Soviet people wanted war.

I replied that it was extremely difficult for us to know what the Soviet people wanted, and that one of the basic causes of our fears and suspicions was the Iron Curtain. So long as Sov maintained a closed system, forbidding free exchange of people and communications, it could not be expected that people in other parts of world would develop confidence in Soviet intentions. Moreover, so far as I was aware, there was no capitalist fifth column in Moscow. Malik replied we had the real Iron Curtain, pointing to our refusal to permit artists and musicians such as Shostakovich coming to US.

Malik told me he was leaving on Gripsholm on July 6 and hoped to have long rest. He said he was very tired and was planning now to stay in bed for several days. He hoped that we might have a talk with each other before he left if he found he had the opportunity.

Later in the evening I had a brief talk with Soldatov of the Sov Delegation. I found him unusually affable, as was Zinchenko who joined us. Soldatov insisted upon importance of our two countries “understanding each other.” He said it was impossible to conceive that we would “destroy each other.” He insisted that we make a great mistake when we talk about so-called Sov plans to dominate the world. The Sov Government “believes in co-existence” and Stalin has made this clear. Our great mistake, Soldatov said, was to fail to realize that since Stalin is head of state, it is important to “consider what he says now” and not what he or others may have said many years ago. Truman and Acheson attacked Stalin but we should realize Stalin has not attacked Truman and Acheson. Moreover, the Soviet press does not tell their people how much the American press writes against the Soviet Union. If they did, the Russian people “would be very disturbed” and would not be willing to accept agreements between us.

At another point during the evening, while I was talking with Zinchenko and Quevedo, the latter brought up question of the offer by the Government of Ecuador of rice for shipment to Korea. Zinchenko, with a smile, said that “soon we will have peace in Korea and it will not be necessary to send the rice.”

Throughout the evening it was quite clear that Malik, Soldatov and Zinchenko were most amiable in their approaches to me and in our conversations.

Gross

1. The dinner took place on June 28; see telegram 6800, June 25, from London, p. 552.
2. June 30.
3. The Conference of the Deputies of the Four Foreign Ministers, in session at the Palais Rose since March 5, had adjourned on June 21 without having accomplished its purpose of preparing an agenda for a Foreign Ministers Conference. For related documentation, see vol. iii, Part 1, pp. 1086 ff.