Foreign Relations of the United States, 1947, The Near East and Africa, Volume V

501.BB Palestine/10–2347

Memorandum by the Secretary of State to the Acting United States Representative at the United Nations (Johnson)¹

secret

New York, October 22, 1947.

Ambassador Johnson: General Hilldring went over the Palestine occurrences of yesterday and stated that he felt that we had to make an early decision as to whether or not we would avoid any direct leadership in lining up votes or not. He explained that the first issue of a vote on principle as to whether or not there should be partition had been in effect tabled for the time being because of the stand of the Chairman, Dr. Evatt, and the resulting vote.²

I authorized him with regard to the next issue—that of amendments to the majority plan on partition and manner of implementation—to line up the vote to support the American proposals.³

G[eorge] C. M[arshall]

1. Copies of this paper were distributed on October 23 to advisers and executive officers in New York. A copy has also been found in 10 files, but there is no indication as to when it was received in the Department of State.
2. Possibly a reference to the proposals by Dr. Evatt on October 21 to appoint various subcommittees and to the voting that took place the following day. For the official record of the meetings of October 21 and 22, see GA (II), Ad Hoc Committee, pp. 126–143.
3. In a letter of October 25, Fraser Wilkins, Adviser to the United States Delegation, informed Mr. Mattison that he had spoken to General Hilldring about the Secretary’s memorandum and had been authorized to communicate with Mr. Mattison about the matter. He described an article appearing in the newspaper PM on October 18 [19] to the effect that although the United States was supporting partition officially, it was privately informing other delegations it did not mean what it had said. He added that an article along somewhat similar lines had appeared in The New York Times of October 20.

   Mr. Wilkins noted that “All of us” vigorously denied this contention. He concluded his letter with the observation that the articles had “nevertheless ‘raised a ghost’ and it has been observed by many persons attending the UN that we did not appear to be ‘lobbying’ for our Palestine position as we are believed to have done in the Greek case and other important issues before the UN.

   “Many members of the U.S. Delegation believe that the position of the United States in world affairs automatically places upon it a major role in the UN, and that unless we actively support positions which we had taken in the UN, we, in that sense, evade our responsibility. It may be recalled that the Secretary has consistently stated that the United States desired strongly to support the UN.

   “It is my belief that it was these general thoughts which the Secretary had in mind in sending his memorandum to Ambassador Johnson. I interpret the Secretary’s recent memorandum to Ambassador Johnson regarding Palestine as being in accord with this basic policy and as authorizing a course which will give testimony of our sincerity. I do not interpret it as indicating that we should ‘browbeat’ the representatives of other countries at the UN into our point of view.

   “Active support of our stated Palestine policy logically follows and is in line with the forthright backing which the United States desires to give to issues which it supports in the UN. If we follow any other course, we might be open to charges of insincerity and duplicity. On the other hand, if we and other nations of like opinion are defeated on such issues, we accept the judgment of the UN, and proceed to consider other means by which a particular question may be resolved.” (501.BB Palestine/10–2547)