Office of the Historian

318. Memorandum of a Telephone Conversation Between the Secretary of State in New York and the Acting Secretary of State in Washington, September 28, 1955, 9:58 a.m.1

New York, September 28, 1955, 9:58 a.m.

H. returned the call, and said last night Allen called.2 The Sec. said he called him this morning. The Sec. said it looks like we ought to call him back right away for consultation.3 H. agrees but the question is how does it look under these circumstances. There are a number of problems that will wait until H. sees the Sec. H. does not know how he is going to be able to deliver the papers4 in view of the telegram last night.5 Allen read the wire to the Sec. H. said that was the basic thinking he had in having . . . go over so H. is not surprised. The Sec. said we are in a dilemma because the Sec. does not believe he can effectively deliver those notes. If we pull him back, it looks like we are breaking relations. H. said Johnston6 . . . cannot do it. On the other hand, we might send Allen7 there. The Sec. mentioned Hare but he does not have a senior position as Allen does. H. said if George goes over—we have had Robertson do that. H. thought we might make such a thing permanent though not at the moment. This would pave the way. The Sec. said the idea to send him over now is excellent. How quickly could he get away. H. will explore it and have schedules looked up. The Sec. said we might get help from the military people from Europe—they could get him to Cairo. The Sec. said if he gets to Paris,Gruenther could probably fix him up. The Sec. said he hopes to be down about 4 and will be in the office.

  1. Source: Eisenhower Library, Dulles Papers, General Telephone Conversations. Transcribed by Bernau.↩
  2. No record of the telephone conversation has been found.↩
  3. Reference apparently is to Ambassador Byroade in Cairo.↩
  4. See Documents 314 and 315.↩
  5. No copy of this message has been found in Department of State files. For Miles Copeland’s account of the circumstances that occasioned the transmission of this message to the Department of State and for its repercussions, see hisThe Game of Nations: The Amorality of Power Politics (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1969), pp. 160–165.↩
  6. Reference is to Ambassador Eric Johnston, who was also in Cairo at that time.↩
  7. Reference is to George Allen.↩