Foreign Relations of the United States: Diplomatic Papers, 1945, The Near East and Africa, Volume VIII

840.50 UNRRA/6–1845

The Ambassador in Greece ( MacVeagh ) to the Secretary of State

No. 1192

Athens , June 18, 1945.
[Received June 25.]

Sir: I have the honor to report that the UNRRA Chief of Mission in Greece, Mr. Buell F. Maben, has again raised the question of participation by members of this Embassy’s staff in the Joint Policy Committee described on pages 2–3 of the Embassy’s Report 74 of May 10, 1945, entitled “UNRRA Advisory Committees in Greece”.³⁸

Mr. Maben, who is an American, stated that while in Washington recently he discussed this question in the Department.³⁹ (It appears probable that there was some connection between his visit and the Department’s telegram 385 of May 11, to which I replied by airgram 184 of May 14.) Mr. Maben also stated that Governor Lehman intended to take up the same matter with high officials of the Department. As of possible assistance in replying to the Governor, and in connection with general policy affecting UNRRA, the following paragraphs are submitted.

As the Department is aware, the British predilection for committees yielded a heavy crop in the Military Liaison period which ended on March 31. These committees were of two general classes, Anglo-American and Anglo-Greco-American. Of the latter the most important in the final stages of ML was the Joint Coordinating Committee. Attendance at the meetings of this committee varied from time to time, but its constitution at the final gathering in the military period, on March 29, was typical. It included six Greek cabinet ministers, one Under Secretary, two Secretaries General, the Governor of the Bank of Greece, the Senior British Naval Officer in Greece, the British Brigadier in charge of Supply and Relief at ML, his Deputy in the person of an American Colonel, Mr. H. A. Hill, Special Assistant to the American Ambassador, Mr. Gardner Patterson, Treasury Representative attached to this Embassy, the British Financial Adviser to HQ Land Forces Greece, the Labor Attaché of the British Embassy, the Delegate of the International Red Cross, the President of the Joint (Swedish-Swiss) Relief Commission, his Swiss Assistant, four members of the UNRRA Mission to Greece, a Greek Secretary and a British Secretary. The American advisers named were allowed by me to serve on this Committee because of the direct participation of the American Government in ML through AFHQ and the War Department, and the Department’s instructions to assist General Scobie with appropriate advice in his strictly relief functions (see the Department’s telegram No. 27 of November 16, 1944).⁴⁰

When ML handed over to UNRRA on April 1st of this year, the cumbersome “Joint Coordinating” Committee was discontinued, but a somewhat similar committee, the Joint Policy Committee, was immediately set up. This was composed of six Greek cabinet ministers and three other high Greek officials, the Chief of the UNRRA Mission to Greece and three of his staff, the British Political Adviser, the British Financial Adviser, the British Economic Adviser, the British Labor Attaché, the Assistant to the President of the Joint Relief Commission and three Secretaries. The Joint Policy Committee has been described in a British document as an “advisory body. . . . . the vehicle through which UNRRA offers advice to the Greek Government at the highest level. All matters in which UNRRA is interested are within its competence. The British and American Political, Economic and Financial Advisers, who took part in the meetings of the Joint Coordinating Committee, have been invited by the Greek Government to be members of the new Committee, which is, therefore, in effect, a tripartite body.” This British description is of course quite incorrect, since no American “political adviser” attended the Joint Coordinating Committee meetings and the invitation to members of the Embassy staff to serve on the new Committee was declined in compliance with the Department’s telegram No. 242 of March 20. However, it shows the intention behind the Committee’s formation.

Since April 14 this Embassy, in accordance with the Department’s instructions, has been giving advice both to UNRRA and to the Greek Government informally when asked and as seemed appropriate, but the Joint Policy Committee has been no more “in effect” than in reality “a tri-partite body”, unless one counts in the participation of the Secretary of the Joint Relief Commission, which was not intended in the above description. Actually the Committee is Anglo-Greek despite attempts to make it look otherwise. The same office building in Athens houses British Military Headquarters, the administrative offices of UNRRA and the four British advisers who serve on the Joint Policy Committee. The latter officials are attached both to the British Embassy and to the Commander of Land Forces Greece, Lt. General Scobie, but in practice they and their staffs have had little other work to do and have devoted almost their full time to advising UNRRA and the Greek Government. The meetings of the Joint Policy Committee are, therefore, simply the outward manifestation of a continuous process by which UNRRA and Greek Government activities are directed to a very considerable extent by a group of able British officials. The fact that the Political Adviser with the rank of Minister who heads the group has now become temporarily Chargé d’Affaires of Great Britain hardly alters this situation.

The most recent development in this connection was a meeting of June 14 at the Bank of Greece under the chairmanship of the Deputy Prime Minister, Mr. Varvaressos, and attended by the Under Secretary of Supply, three UNRRA and three British officials. The Chairman proposed that the Joint Policy Committee should become the Economic Advisory Committee, which would hold weekly meetings at the Bank of Greece. It was agreed that the new Committee would be purely advisory and not responsible for decisions or executive action taken by the Greek Government. Both the British Financial Adviser and the UNRRA Chief of Mission approved of this clarification, which constitutes a step in the right direction. In actual practice, however, comparatively little change may be anticipated except in so far as Mr. Varvaressos may dominate the Committee by his personality. An interesting side light is the fact that the minutes of the June 14 meeting were drafted by a British Lieutenant Colonel, mimeographed at British Military Headquarters and distributed in envelopes marked “On His Majesty’s Service”.

Without criticizing in detail the activities of the British advisers described above, American UNRRA representatives here have sometimes expressed the feeling that they are being “pushed around” by the British. Not unnaturally, they look to the American Embassy for support, but in the circumstances it is not apparent how such support can be extended beyond the informal advice always available outside the framework of the Committee, which is of course not what these harassed individuals want. Should the Department revise its policy and instruct this Embassy to participate in the Committee, the British would doubtless profess satisfaction, but the consequences might very well be regrettable owing to a fundamental divergence in the British and American conceptions of UNRRA, at least locally. Thus some time ago the British Ambassador to Greece told the former UNRRA Chief of Mission here that UNRRA in Greece ought to be an Anglo-American undertaking, and that no Russian participation was desired, and it has become more and more clear as time has gone on that the British look upon UNRRA here rather as an extension of ML than as a joint enterprise of the United Nations. To participate in their Joint Policy Committee under such circumstances would either expose us to misunderstanding of our views as to UNRRA’s proper functions or involve us in opposition within the Committee which could not fail to be deleterious to UNRRA operations.

This whole question would appear to be one for clarification on higher levels. From the standpoint of practical economics, the present British direction of UNRRA here is probably at least as competent as would result from broader international participation, but politically the effect is unfortunate, and the Department may well wish to consider it from the point of view of high policy. The objection to the present situation is, of course, that it represents frank sphere-of-interest politics, in the same manner as recent British action in influencing the making and breaking of Greek Governments. Whether or not such action happens to be for the best short-term interests of Greece, it furnishes the perfect excuse for unilateral action by other powers elsewhere, and to that degree may be considered prejudicial to a world-situation of which Greece forms a part. What can be done to solve the problem created, short of persuading the British to take a different stand, is another question. It has been suggested that it might improve the present local situation of UNRRA if our Government were to set up an independent advisory body in Athens which would be equivalent in every way to the British. But this would fall short of the United Nations conception and, in any event, would involve serious personnel and organizational problems. Anything less than such an effort, on the other hand, could have little effect on the situation as it exists. Hill and Patterson performed useful service on the former Joint Coordinating Committee, but they were quite impotent (and this is no reflection on them) to exert any appreciable influence over policies introduced by senior British officials and supported by personal visits from Messrs. Churchill, Alexander,⁴¹ Macmillan⁴² and a series of other outstanding figures in British public life. In over-all effect, their minority presence on a policy-determining committee merely supplied U.S. association with British activities without the possibility of influencing these activities to any important degree.

In conclusion, I would stress that while, in line with the Department’s instructions as set forth in its telegram 385 of May 11, and practically ever since ML turned over, the Embassy has had an officer assigned to liaison duties with UNRRA, which involves daily contacts and detailed reports to the Department, and in addition, this officer and the Economic Counselor⁴³ attend weekly staff meetings at UNRRA where the British advisers also are present, to go further at present seems undesirable as a matter of policy as well as impracticable from the standpoint of available personnel. I sympathize with the inferior position of the Americans in UNRRA, but I am convinced that a fundamental solution of their problem is beyond the competence of anyone in Athens. With the shifting of various UNRRA functions from Washington to London, and particularly with Commander Jackson⁴⁴ in his present influential position, UNRRA in Greece seems likely to become more and more an instrument of British policy, in a manner similar to the Middle East Supply Center.⁴⁵ That it is British-controlled at present is undeniable, and the whole conception of what UNRRA is and stands for is accordingly at stake. Should the United States parallel British action here with a more aggressive independent policy of its own in supplying official advice and guidance, it would only duplicate grounds for objection by other UNRRA members, and in addition create the impression of competition between the Anglo-Saxon powers for benefits to accrue from an enterprise shared in by over forty other nations. What would seem possibly necessary at this time, therefore, is the discovery and institution of practical and effective methods for bringing the UNRRA effort (not only in London and Washington, but here in Greece as well) on to the broadest possible international basis, to save UNRRA’s own credit and make clear beyond any question the disinterestedness in this great project of both Great Britain and the United States.

Respectfully yours,

Lincoln MacVeagh

38. Not printed.
39. See memorandum by William O. Baxter, May 5, p. 216.
40. Foreign Relations, 1944, vol. v., p. 205.
41. Field Marshal Sir Harold Alexander, Supreme Allied Commander, Mediterranean Theater.
42. British Minister Resident at Allied Force Headquarters, Mediterranean Theater.
43. Karl L. Rankin.
44. R. G. A. Jackson, an Australian, Senior Deputy Director of UNRRA and Acting Personal Representative of the Director General of UNRRA in charge of the European Regional Office at London.
45. For documentation on the dissolution of the Middle East Supply Center, see pp. 85 ff.