501.BB Palestine/3–1948

Memorandum by Mr. Robert M. McClintock to the Counselor ( Bohlen )

top secret

Since I shall not be in the Department this afternoon I thought it would be well to inform you that Paris and Nanking have instructed [Page 747] their representatives at Lake Success to go along with us on the draft working paper submitted in USUN’s 309 yesterday.1 Mr. Rusk believes that with French and Chinese support it will be possible for Ambassador Austin to give our entire twelve-point program, rather than, as was suggested last night, to stop half way with the stress on the Security Council’s responsibility for maintaining international peace and security.

I reaffirmed to Mr. Rusk this morning our strong view that our program was an integral one and that the suggestion for calling a special session to establish a trusteeship for Palestine was as important as any other aspect of the proposed statement.

I communicated the substance of the foregoing to Mr. Lovett on Carl Humelsine’s phone this morning and summarized briefly the meeting in your office yesterday. Mr. Lovett thought that that portion of the Department’s telegram 144 of March 18 to New York which you cleared with Mr. Forrestal should also be checked with the President.

For your convenience I attach a copy of the policy paper on Palestine which was approved by President Truman on February 21, 1948.2 The policy regarding possible use of force to maintain international peace and security is set forth in Paragraph 8, while the position on calling a special session to establish a trusteeship is found in Paragraph 12.

  1. Dated March 17, not printed; but see footnote 1, p. 739.
  2. Ante, see p. 637.