840.50/946
The Secretary of State to the British Ambassador ( Halifax )2
The Secretary of State presents his compliments to His Excellency the British Ambassador and has the honor to reply to his note of December 21, 1942,3 with reference to the draft plan for the establishment of a United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration.4
The Secretary of State notes with pleasure the agreement of the British Government on the broad lines of the scheme, and its disposition to cooperate in carrying it out in the near future, subject to certain points raised in the memorandum accompanying the Ambassador’s communication to which careful consideration is being given by the United States Government.
Similar concurrence, subject in each case to certain conditions and points for further discussion, has been received from the Chinese Government5 and from the Government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics,6 and there is attached a memorandum7 stating the views of each of those Governments with reference to the proposal under consideration.
With a view to obtaining agreement among the Governments of Great Britain, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, China, and the United States, on the draft to be laid before the other United Nations Governments at the earliest appropriate opportunity, and on the procedure to be followed in carrying the scheme into effect, the Secretary of State proposes that representatives of the above four Governments meet with him in Washington at 11:30 o’clock on January 11, 1943, to consider these matters.
- Similar notes were sent on January 8 to the Chinese Ambassador (Wei) and to the Soviet Ambassador (Litvinov).↩
- Foreign Relations, 1942, vol. i, p. 156.↩
- The draft plan at this time under consideration was “Draft No. 2”, dated August 13, 1942, ibid., p. 121.↩
- See telegram No. 1386, November 24, 1942, 2 p.m., from the Ambassador in China, ibid., p. 148.↩
- See note of December 29, 1942, from the Soviet Embassy, ibid., p. 159.↩
- Not printed.↩