800.014 Antarctic/1–848
The Secretary of the Interior (Krug) to the Acting Secretary of State
My Dear Mr. Secretary: This will acknowledge your secret communication of December 11 (Reference NOE) requesting the comment of the Department of the Interior on a recommendation embodied in an enclosed memorandum as well as on the problems related to the formulation of a new United States policy with respect to Antarctica.2
This Department favors the proposal for the establishment of a common control over Antarctica by the countries which in the past have been most actively interested in Antarctica, such common control to take the form of a special trusteeship arrangement. This position, of course assumes that under the terms of the special trusteeship arrangement adequate provision will be made for the conservation of mineral and biological resources and that the United States will be assured of its fair and proportionate share of both the known and the potential resources of Antarctica and its neighboring waters.
On the matter of a general United States policy with respect to Antarctica, this Department is primarily concerned with the natural resources. In this respect it is felt that the United States should assert its claims as effectively as possible. Detailed comments on matters having to do with minerals and mapping in the Antarctic will be submitted to you at a later date.
Sincerely yours,
- Under cover of identical letters to the Secretaries of the Army, Navy, and Interior (dated December 11, 1947) and to the Secretaries of the Air Force and Commerce (dated December 16, 1947), the Secretary of State transmitted copies of a memorandum on proposed United States Antarctic policy. For text, see ibid., pp. 1055–1056.↩