176. Memorandum From the Secretary of State to the President1
SUBJECT
- Letter from King Zahir of Afghanistan Concerning “Pushtunistan”
On October 15 I sent you a memorandum2 summarizing the reports of our Ambassadors in Pakistan and Afghanistan on the status of the “Pushtunistan” dispute. I concurred in their recommendations that we take no further initiative in seeking a settlement of this complex question. This is in accordance with the policy we have followed for many years of encouraging bilateral negotiations between the two countries without direct intervention on our part.
On October 17 the Afghan Ambassador delivered to me for transmission to you a letter from the King of Afghanistan, which I enclose.3 In this letter the King assumes erroneously that you undertook to inject yourself into the “Pushtunistan” dispute. This clearly goes well [Page 366] beyond your statement to Afghan Deputy Prime Minister Naim in New York on September 23 that you would take a “new look” into the matter to see if you could in any way be helpful.
In view of the recommendations of our Ambassadors in Pakistan and Afghanistan, with which I fully concur, I believe we should without delay disengage ourselves from any attempt by the Afghan Government to pin us down to intervention in the “Pushtunistan” issue. I am also of the opinion that the record should be clarified to show that in your conversation with the Afghan Deputy Prime Minister you undertook only to look into the matter and not to enter directly into any attempt to settle the dispute. You specifically excluded mediation. The enclosed draft letter from you to King Zahir, to be delivered by our Ambassador, seeks to achieve both these ends.
I therefore recommend that you sign the enclosed letter to King Zahir. I further recommend that this correspondence not be made public. To any inquiries from officials of the Pakistan Government concerning this matter, we will continue to reply that nothing of substance regarding the “Pushtunistan” problem has been discussed with the Afghans.4
- Source: Department of State, Central Files, 689.90D/10–1860. Secret; Presidential Handling. Drafted by Poullada on October 17.↩
- Supra. ↩
- Dated October 12, not printed. A memorandum of Herter’s conversation with Maiwandwal, drafted by T. Eliot Weil, is in Department of State, Central Files, 689.90D/10–1760. A copy of Zahir’s letter to Eisenhower was also attached to that memorandum of conversation.↩
- According to a note on the source text, the White House approved the draft letter with slight changes and forwarded it to the Department of State on October 24. The letter is printed infra.↩
- Printed from a copy that bears this stamped signature.↩