Foreign Relations of the United States, 1952–1954, Western Europe and Canada, Volume VI, Part 1

850.33/8–2752

No. 96
Memorandum of Telephone Conversation, by the Acting Director of the Office of European Regional Affairs (Parsons)¹

confidential

Washington, August 27, 1952.

Subject:

• Press Release on U.S. Representation at Schuman Plan

Participants:

• William M. Tomlinson, Paris
• J. C. H. Bonbright, EUR
• J. Graham Parsons, EUR/RA

The attached text of a release² to be made in Paris by Ambassador Draper on U.S. representation at the European Coal and Steel Community was dictated to Mr. Tomlinson’s secretary at 3:30 this afternoon and the accuracy of the dictation was verified by her reading it back to me. The present text is in substitution for that contained in Polto 209³ which was received in the Department late yesterday afternoon. Mr. Gordon in DMS had telephoned the Acting Secretary with regard to the Polto 209 text to which he had fundamental objections, namely (1) that the text represented a degree of finalization of our representation to the Schuman Plan well beyond that envisaged by Topol 88⁴ at this stage, and (2) that it was predicated on the need to parallel the United Kingdom action, whereas the situation of the United States and the United Kingdom is not exactly parallel. In addition, both we and Mr. Gordon had other objections.

The present text was agreed upon by Mr. Gordon, myself and Mr. Baum of MSA who subsequently cleared with Mr. Wood of MSA. Mr. Bruce, Mr. Bonbright and Miss Kirkpatrick approved the present text and its substance was cleared with Mr. Vernon. Mr. Riddleberger was satisfied with those portions of the first text of interest to GER and has received a copy of the revision.

Following up his several recent calls to Mr. Bonbright and myself, Mr. Tomlinson telephoned this morning at 11:30 to ascertain if we had cleared the text contained in Polto 209. I informed him that we were unable to clear it and hoped to telephone him our revisions within three or four hours. Mr. Tomlinson telephoned again just before 3:30. He at first indicated that the revisions were not consistent with the authority granted to SRE in Topol 88, whereas all Washington agencies are in agreement that the revisions conform more closely thereto. He indicated also that Mr. Draper and Mr. Merchant would be embarrassed because in conversation with M. Monnet they had disclosed to him we would have a “permanent delegation” to the Schuman Plan rather than, at this stage, merely “representation”. Mr. Bonbright and I explained that we could not authorize further changes without re-clearance which would make any release impossible today. We said that we did not wish to embarrass Mr. Draper, Mr. Merchant or Mr. Tomlinson and asked if they wished to have us reopen the text with the other agencies. Mr. Tomlinson had Mr. Draper on another wire in Paris and, after consulting him, said that the latter did not wish to reopen the matter and would accept the text we gave them. In response to my question, Mr. Tomlinson said that there was no need to send him a niact giving the text which his secretary had taken down accurately. We also left him authority to notify the other Schuman Plan capitals in discretion. We said that we would not issue any release here without word from him.

Subsequent to the conversation, I was given an Agence France ticker item indicating that Mr. Draper and M. Monnet had discussed the form of future American representation and asserting that announcement of a decision to appoint a U.S. permanent delegation to the Schuman Plan would be made shortly. Our revision, of course, deletes the reference to a permanent delegation first, because the connotation of “permanent”, and second, because delegation normally implies membership in an organization as, for instance, our delegation to the United Nations. I believe the deletion of this word, which had evidently been used with Monnet and the press before clearance with Washington, was the primary cause of the embarrassment of our representatives which Mr. Tomlinson alluded to in his conversation with us.

1. Copies were sent to Bonbright and Camp.
2. Not printed. A copy of the press release, which was issued in Paris by the Office of the U.S. Special Representative in Europe on Aug. 27, is in Bruce Mission files, lot 57 M 38, “CSC–U.S. Representation.”
3. See footnote 3, Document 92.
4. Document 85.