501.BB/11–1947
Memorandum for the File by Mr. Robert M. McClintock
Mr. Rusk telephoned at 4 p. m. to say that Ambassador Johnson was poised to enter the 3 p. m. meeting of the Subcommittee on the Majority Report and prepared to carry out to the letter the Department’s instruction on the Negeb as set forth in our telegram this morning [afternoon] with the subsequent modification that the USDel need not maintain its position on the Negeb after the point where it was defeated in the Subcommittee. Ambassador Johnson was further prepared, if there was a fighting chance at all to carry our position on the Negeb, to take it up in the ad hoc Committee.
At this point President Truman, who had seen Dr. Wizeman1 today, telephoned General Hilldring. The President asked General Hilldring how things were going and Hilldring said he was not too happy. Hilldring told the President of the instruction received this morning [afternoon] from the Department on the Negeb and apparently repeated that he was not pleased with these instructions.* President Truman then said that nothing should be done to “upset the apple-cart.”
Mr. Rusk said it was obvious that there had not been enough discussion on either side during this brief telephone conversation for the President to have a clear idea as to the substance of the matter at issue.
Mr. Rusk added that Mr. Bohlen2 had the story from General Hilldring and that I could find out from him what Hilldring had reported.
Mr. Rusk said that there were two points which should be emphasized to Mr. Lovett following a consultation with Mr. Bohlen:
- 1.
- That Ambassador Johnson in no sense had intended to change his instructions or had asked to have them changed.
- 2.
- All that the USDel plans to do today in the Subcommittee is to keep silent and to permit the Subcommittee report to go to the ad hoc committee as a unanimous report but noting US reservations with regard to the Negeb and to the financial arrangements under the economic union.
This will at least leave the door ajar for the USDel to revert to these issues in the ad hoc committee.
In conclusion Mr. Rusk thought Mr. Lovett should be informed that the Subcommittee has been dealing with the JA exclusively; that the US has been the only Delegation with sufficient courage or conviction to dissent from the JA and that the other Members of the Subcommittee have by and large remained silent.3
- Chaim Weizmann, former President of the Executive of the Jewish Agency.↩
- Mr. Bohlen later told me that General Hilldring told the President that neither he nor Mr. Johnson were at all pleased with this morning’s telegram. [Footnote in the source text.]↩
- Charles E. Bohlen, Counselor of the Department. A memorandum of November 19 by Mr. Bohlen to Mr. Lovett notes that General Hilldring called Mr. Bohlen “urgently” at about 4 p.m. on November 19, informing him of a personal telephone call he had just received from President Truman. “The President said he personally agreed with Weizmann’s views and although he apparently did not issue any direct instruction, he made it plain that he wished the Delegation to go along with the majority report on the Negeb case.… General Hilldring said that in the circumstances in view of the contradictions between the President’s wish … and the definite instructions from the Department to the opposite effect, he and Ambassador Johnson felt that they would not take a U.S. position this afternoon in the Subcommittee but would through the Chairman make it plain that the U.S. position would be made clear either later today or early tomorrow morning.” (867N.01/11–1947)↩
- According to a memorandum for the files of November 19 by Mr McClintock, Mr. Lovett telephoned Mr. McClintock at 6:45 p. m. “to say he had talked with the President regarding General Hilldring’s conversation with the White House earlier today. The President had not at all intended to change the Department’s instructions, he had merely been concerned that the U.S. should not stand out as a useless minority.… Mr. Lovett had communicated this to Ambassador Johnson, General Hilldring and Mr. Rusk in New York.” (501.BB Palestine/11–1947)↩