Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961–1963, Volume XXI, Africa

334. Telegram From the Department of State to the Consulate General in Salisbury⁰

Washington, November 30, 1962, 6:26 p.m.

308. For Geren from Williams. Department currently reviewing possibilities exerting greater US influence in Southern Rhodesia after December 14 elections. Your comments this regard in contels 193¹ and 199² most helpful.

To maintain momentum gained from recent talk with Whitehead request you convey to him orally at earliest opportunity my appreciation for his having come to Washington and for his forthright and encouraging exposition GSR intention move toward genuine non-racial government. Assure him, as practical politician I understand his need for sizable majority in new legislature to contain reactionaries and to move forward with liberal program. I hope he is successful in forthcoming elections. At same time, reiterate my concern that Whitehead timetable for increasing African participation in government still seems too slow and could be speeded up without jeopardizing good government and high standards in Southern Rhodesia. Report reactions soonest.³

Rusk

0. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 745C.00/11-1062. Confidential; Limit Distribution. Drafted by Dunham on November 21; cleared by Knox, Burdett, Furnas, and McGhee (in substance); and approved by Williams. Repeated to London.
1. Dated November 5. (Ibid., 745C.00/11-562)
2. Dated November 10. (Ibid., 745C.00/11-1062)
3. In telegram 309 to Salisbury, November 30, Williams instructed Consul General Paul Geren to arrange an interview with a representative of the ZAPU leadership as soon as possible after seeing Whitehead in order to attempt to ascertain the conditions under which African nationalists could be induced to seek their goals within the framework of the new constitution and to ask what U.S. and British roles they realistically envisaged. Geren was told to stress the confidential character of his approach and to mention the U.S. view that the new constitution offered new challenges and new opportunities for the African nationalist leadership. (Ibid., 745C.00/11-3062)