501.BB Palestine/3–1748
Memorandum by Mr. Robert M. McClintock to the Director of the Executive Secretariat (Humelsine)
There is little in UNA this morning for your telephone call to Mr. Lovett.1
On Palestine Mr. Lovett should be told that any press report to the contrary there has been no agreement between the US, USSR, and France, to urge the Security Council to make a finding that international peace and security is threatened in and around Palestine. For Mr. Lovett’s strictly private information it has seemed during the past few days that Ambassador Austin has been trending along the line followed by Mr. Gromyko which would place a finding of a threat to international peace and security as the prior business of the Security Council before it deals with the question of Palestine partition. However, Mr. Rusk telephoned me late last night to say that he thought it almost ninety percent sure that Ambassador Austin had been got back on the track and that the instructions which the Secretary and Mr. Lovett approved yesterday would hold.
Mr. Rusk telephoned at 9:25 this morning to inquire if the Department would have any objection if China, France, and the US jointly drew conclusions from the Big Five consultation of the past ten days [Page 732] and on the basis of these conclusions recommended the program which the Department has reaffirmed to Ambassador Austin as being our tactical position, in order to dispose of the partition issue. I told Mr. Rusk that offhand I could see no objection but that I would check with Mr. Bohlen.
- Mr. Lovett had departed from Washington on March 15 for a vacation in Florida; he returned to the Department by March 27.↩