161. Letter From the Ambassador in Belgium (Burden) to Secretary of State Herter0
Dear Chris: I returned to Brussels yesterday and hasten to thank you for all the time and trouble you took to consider Belgian problems during my visit to Washington.
I know what a difficult position you have, to be in charge of United States foreign policy, in endeavoring to build a position for the West in Africa, keep the Russians out of key African countries, and at the same time not do too much damage to our relationship with our NATO allies and to the NATO structure itself.
It is inevitable in a situation like the present that the emergency nature of the Congo crisis should cause most problems to be considered primarily from the Congo point of view. I took this position myself during the early months of my service in Brussels and devoted a very large part of my time, as you know to developing plans to anticipate some of the critical problems which we thought likely to emerge, particularly financial ones. However, I think the pendulum has now swung too much in the Congo direction and we must give full consideration to the very serious damage which our actions are causing to Belgo-American relations and to NATO as a whole. I am sure Larry Norstad1 has talked to you about the latter.
I am of course prepared to take any action here which is necessary to United States policy, no matter how unpalatable it is to the Belgians but I do want to be sure that the possible effect on Belgium and on NATO has been fully considered before it is taken, and I will, of course, always draw such possible effects to your attention. I am sure that continued problems of this nature will arise because of the inevitable dichotomy of trying to do as much as possible in Africa without too much damage in Europe.
Specifically, I think there is much too much of a tendency to meet all Hammarskjold’s demands, no matter how unreasonable, and for the United States to be willing to make unilateral representations with the Belgians and elsewhere in Europe without any assurance that we will be backed up by the British and French. This has already happened twice and I hope it won’t happen again. When it does, the British and French either back the Belgians or abstain, and the blame all falls on us. Nor do I think that we will achieve success by meeting all of the demands of the Congolese rapidly and at the cost of our [Page 385] friends. Such a policy, as I explained in Washington, will only result in more and more unreasonable demands, and there are limits to what we should do.
I know that no one is more fully aware of the importance of our European relationships than you, and that you have a special soft spot in your heart for Brussels, because of your prior service here.2 I do hope you will keep these elements of the problem very much in mind.
With kindest regards,
Sincerely,