41. Memorandum of a Conversation, Secretary Dulles’ Residence, Washington, January 27, 1957,6 p.m.1
PARTICIPANTS
- The Secretary
- British Defense Minister,
- Duncan Sandys
- Ambassador Caccia
We discussed generally the problem of creating better relations. Caccia said that the beginning of disillusionment with US policy came when we put a different interpretation upon the Users Association [Page 64] than that which had been put upon it by the British, and when I said that we would not “shoot our way” through the Canal. The British had assumed that it was implicit in the Users Association that if the Egyptians did not accept the Users Association, we would in fact “shoot our way” through the Canal.
I said that the difficulty, it seemed to me, arose from the fact that there had perhaps been an honest difference of opinion with respect to the problem of the Users Association but that one of the difficulties was that the British and French had never themselves been willing to have their ships pay tolls to the Users Association. They wanted to go on paying to the account of the old Suez Canal Company in London. This would mean that the United States alone of the major powers would be working through the Users Association and it would mean that our boats alone would be stopped and we alone would have to carry the entire burden of the operation. Mr. Sandys made no comment on this phase of the matter. He did say that he thought it was good to get some of these things “off his chest”, as a basis for a future understanding.
We discussed the problem of getting ready to meet the re-opening of the Suez Canal. I read to Sandys and Caccia the draft of a cable to Lodge for presentation to Hammarskjold.2 This suggested inter alia that Hammarskjold should, as rapidly as possible, resume talks with the Egyptians and with the UK and France as representatives of the users, thus following the pre-November pattern. Both Caccia and Sandys expressed themselves as very much pleased with the proposed telegram.
We discussed briefly the proposed UK armament cuts and I expressed the hope that this could be worked out in a way which would minimize the shock to NATO. Mr. Sandys said he hoped so, but that the cut had to come irrespective of NATO.