740.00119 Control (Bulgaria)/7–1445
No. 316
Memorandum by the Acting
Director of the Office of European Affairs (Hickerson)
Memorandum of Conversation
| Participants: | Mr. Paul Gore-Booth, First Secretary, British Embassy; |
| Mr. Hickerson, EUR |
Mr. Paul Gore-Booth, First Secretary of the British Embassy, came in to see me late yesterday afternoon at his request. He said that although members of the Embassy had had several discussions with State Department officials on the subject and although the Embassy had received several telegrams from the British foreign office in regard to its understanding of the U. S. attitude on the subject, he was not clear in his own mind about one aspect of our attitude concerning Bulgaria and Roumania. This was, he continued, the question of whether the U. S. believed that recognition of the two governments and perhaps conclusion of peace treaties should be deferred until after the governments had been reorganized.
I told Mr. Gore-Booth that the U. S. position was that the governments should be reorganized before either diplomatic recognition or the conclusion of peace treaties with them and that the President and the Secretary of State would take this position in the forthcoming conversations at Potsdam and endeavor to induce Mr. Churchill and Marshal Stalin to agree to that position.
Mr. Gore-Booth said that he was certain that British officials at Potsdam would support the American view even though they had little hope that the Soviet Government would agree to it. He added that it was his understanding that if the Soviet Government does not [Page 414] agree to the U. S. position the British officials will then endeavor to persuade the U. S. to agree to the early recognition of the two governments and the early conclusion of peace treaties with them.