Office of the Historian

72. Action Memorandum From the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs (Williams) to the Ambassador at Large (Harriman)1

Washington, June 25, 1965.

SUBJECT

  • Possible Oil Company Supported Foundation to Assist Libya’s Economic Development

You will recall that the Department and AID gave considerable attention last year to the possible establishment of an oil company foundation which would take over, at least to some degree, the activities of the AID Mission in Libya following the termination of the AID program [Page 109] in that country on June 30, 1965. Your personal interest in this matter did much to stimulate the oil company representatives to explore the subject and to send a survey team consisting of Dr. Alvin Eurich and Dr. Jesse Hobson to Libya in February. There is attached a Memorandum of Conversation2 describing the team’s talk with representatives of AID and of State last April, following their return from Libya.

You will note in the last paragraph of the Memorandum of Conversation, Dr. Eurich’s statement that the survey team’s report would be ready in a few weeks for submission to the oil industry committee in New York. So far as we know, the report has not yet been submitted to the industry representatives and no decision has therefore been made with respect to the foundation.

The slowness with which the industry representatives have moved on this matter is a source of very real concern to us inasmuch as AID plans to close out in Libya on June 30, except for some twenty advisors on contract to the Libyan Government, who were AID-recruited and are partly AID supported out of previous fiscal year funds. Henry Heuser, the AID representative, may remain in Libya until July or August and will then depart.

Thus we seem to be coming to a period soon when we will have neither the AID Mission nor the oil company foundation, and the latter is not even a certainty for some time in the future.

Recommendation:

That you telephone Mr. M.A. Wright of SONJ and express your concern that there has apparently not yet been a definite decision to follow up concretely on this excellent initiative of last year to establish a foundation to help maintain a U.S. advisory presence in Libya.3

  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, AID (US) LIBYA. Confidential. Drafted by McClanahan.↩
  2. Not attached.↩
  3. Harriman initialed his approval on June 29.↩