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Memorandum of Conversation, by the Chief of the Aviation Division (Morgan)

[Washington,] September 21, 1944.

Commander Dahl84 called at his request to give me some information in strictest confidence. He said that the British Government was much upset because we had not invited Argentina to the international aviation conference. As a result, he informed me, the British Ambassador has been instructed by the Foreign Office to call upon the Secretary and make a strong plea for the inclusion of Argentina.85

I told Commander Dahl that while I could not, of course, say what reply the Secretary would make to the Ambassador, I wondered what the attitude of the British Government would be towards the conference if the Secretary did not see his way to agree to such a request. Commander Dahl said that while he thought it unthinkable that the British would not attend the conference if Argentina was not included, he felt that there would be a good deal of dissatisfaction which would probably be reflected in difficulties and complications, possibly a request for postponement, etc. I told him this would be most unfortunate and I would be very much surprised if the British, out of their concern for Argentina, found it impossible to cooperate with the 53 other nations in trying to develop post-war aviation along the lines which are so urgently needed.

Commander Dahl also made the following observations: That the British were dissatisfied because we had invited Eire and not Argentina; and also that we had invited Thailand, which Great Britain does not recognize. I pointed out to him that we had simply invited the Thai Minister in his personal capacity, just as we had invited the Danish Minister.

I gathered that Commander Dahl’s motive in visiting me was simply to have the information passed on, perhaps in the hope that some consideration would be given in advance of the Ambassador’s [Page 546] call to the possibility of changing policy or in the hope that some formula might be worked out for a reply to the Ambassador which would not be too uncompromising.

S. W. Morgan
  1. Wing Commander Raoul Dahl, former Assistant Air Attaché of the British Embassy at Washington, was in the United States at this time on a new assignment relating entirely to security matters.↩
  2. No record of conversation with British Ambassador has been found in Department files.↩