840.50 Recovery/5–2548
The Irish Minister of External Affairs (MacBride), Temporarily in Washington, to the Director of the Office of European Affairs (Hickerson)
Dear Mr. Hickerson: As arranged, I am sending herewith a copy of a memorandum1 which I am sending to Mr. Hoffman today.
This memorandum deals with economic considerations. In addition to these, there are one or two additional considerations which I did not set out in the memorandum to Mr. Hoffman, as I felt that being more of a political nature, it would not be appropriate to do so in a memorandum to the E.C.A. I set them out for your consideration hereunder:
- 1.
- In the event of a war, it seems to me that Ireland’s capacity
to produce food is vital. Britain, as well as other European
countries, would require every ounce of food that Ireland can
produce so as to minimize a drain on the resources of the United
States and to conserve shipping space.
For this reason, it seems to me that the rapid rehabilitation of such agricultural output is of primary importance. - 2.
- While I appreciate fully that the State Department’s view is that it is not directly concerned with the partition of Ireland issue, this issue does, however, unfortunately project itself into the loan versus grant question.
- It is inevitable that the fact that dollars are being given by way of grant to the six county area through Britain, whereas aid by way of grant is not being made available to Ireland will be construed as support by the United States to the continuance of partition. This will tend to create an unfavourable impression.
- The fact that the six county area has a favourable balance with the Western Hemisphere and is not therefore faced with a dollar shortage will only serve to fortify the impression that some political significance attaches to the decision of ECA.
- I feel quite certain that no such political considerations influenced the views of the State Department or of the ECA, but I fear that nevertheless, whether we like it or not, such implications in the public mind are inevitable.
I would like to take this opportunity of thanking you for the understanding and consideration with which you dealt with our problem. [Page 445] It has been a very real pleasure for us to meet you and I hope that we shall meet again in the future.
Yours sincerely,
- The accompanying memorandum, not printed, stated that Ireland wished to contribute to the maximum of its ability to the economic recovery of Western Europe, described the problems of Irish recovery, and expressed “concern that participation in the program should not entail the contracting of a heavy and irrepayable external debt.” The memorandum urged that imports vital to the recovery program be “financed within the scope of the E.R.P.”↩
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Mr. MacBride added the following in his own handwriting as a postscript: “While gardening or sucking a pipe in your leisure hours I hope that you may give a fleeting thought to the problems we were discussing the other evening. [At this point the original contains a marginal notation “Western Union and ultimately a U.S. of Europe J(ohn) H(ickerson)] If at any time you want to discuss this with me don’t hesitate to let me know. I shall always make time to come over—unless we can persuade you to come to Ireland instead.
“Please don’t bother to acknowledge this note. S. MacB.”
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