Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1943, The Near East and Africa, Volume IV

883.24/207

The Department of State to the Egyptian Legation

Aide-Mémoire

As the Government of Egypt is aware, on February 23, 1942 this Government concluded a lend-lease agreement with the United Kingdom¹ pursuant to the provisions of the Lend-Lease Act of the United States of March 11, 1941,² and has since concluded similar agreements with China, the Soviet Union, Belgium, Poland, the Netherlands, Greece, Czechoslovakia, Norway, Yugoslavia, and Liberia. Australia and New Zealand also have accepted the principles of the agreement with the United Kingdom. These agreements seek to state as accurately as is now possible the basis on which aid under the Act is furnished, and to assure the greatest possible degree of cooperation in the task of post-war economic reconstruction through agreed action open to participation by all other like-minded nations.

After careful consideration in the light of the Lend-Lease Act and of the policies developed thereunder, this Government believes that a lend-lease agreement with Egypt similar to the agreements with the United Kingdom and other nations would be mutually advantageous. Accordingly, there is attached for the consideration of the Egyptian Government a draft text of such an agreement, and of accompanying exchange of notes.³ In the examination of these documents the following points may be noted:

1. The text of the proposed agreement is the same in substance as that signed between the United States and the United Kingdom.

2. The draft exchange of notes sets forth some-what more specifically than the master agreement the terms of payment for goods and services furnished to Egypt under the Act of March 11, 1941. They also include a paragraph with respect to the disposition after the present war of certain installations on Egyptian territory. It is believed that the proposed collateral exchange of notes would be flexible enough in practice to meet all possible contingencies without causing undue hardship to either party to the agreement.

3. With reference to the conversations contemplated by Article VII of the proposed new agreement looking forward to agreed action “directed to the expansion, by appropriate international and domestic measures, of production, employment, and the exchange and consumption of goods” and to the attainment of the other objectives stated in the Article, the Government of the United States would be prepared to enter into informal and exploratory discussions at the convenience of the Egyptian Government.

A copy of the lend-lease agreement with the United Kingdom referred to in the first paragraph, and a copy of the Joint Declaration made on August 14, 1941,⁴ referred to in Article VII of the draft agreement submitted herewith, are enclosed for convenient reference.

Washington , August 9, 1943.

1. Signed at Washington, February 23, 1942, Department of State Executive Agreement Series No. 241, or 56 Stat, (pt 2) 1433.
2. 55 Stat. 31.
3. None printed.
4. Joint statement by President Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Churchill, known as the Atlantic Charter, Foreign Relations, 1941, vol. i, p. 367.