840.20/4–1549
Memorandum by the Secretary of State to the Director of the Office of European Affairs (Hickerson)
On March 28 General Wedemeyer, Deputy Chief of Staff for Plans and Combat Operations, sent Col. Walter Grant, the Department of the Army Liaison Officer with the State Department, to me with a letter involving two matters.
The second of these was as follows:
“Another matter which I had hoped to discuss was an arrangement that was made during General Eisenhower’s incumbency as Chief of Staff. General Marshall asked that one officer be designated in the Department of Army to maintain contact with a General Billotte, the French Military Representative in the United Nations at Lake Success. I was designated to fill this liaison role approximately twelve months ago. I have had a few meetings here in Washington with the French General. The French for the past several months had been striving to arrange for staff conferences with American military men. Frequently they suggested that they should be included in the membership of the Combined Chiefs of Staff. However, uniformly in the State Department and in the Department of Army, as well as in the Joint Chiefs of Staff, it was indicated to the French that the Combined Chiefs of Staff is no longer extant. I was admonished not to make any commitments in my conversations with the French concerning military collaboration. Further, I was told to carry on conversations that would cause the French to feel that at least they had an opportunity to express their military views to someone in Washington. Every two or three months, General Billotte visited my office. We had pleasant conversations, none of which amounted to anything from the American viewpoint; however, he did outline French views concerning the developing strategic situation in Western Europe. I kept General Eisenhower informed while he was Chief of Staff and subsequently General Bradley.1 Recently I suggested to General Bradley that my meetings with General Billotte could properly be discontinued. I am quite certain that he will be asking for an appointment in the next few weeks. I believe that I should do so, but indicate tactfully that he unquestionably will impart to committees within the framework of the North Atlantic Treaty, the information he had been transmitting to me in the past. If you approve of this step, I will inform General Bradley and take appropriate steps.”
I suggested to Col. Grant that he say for me to General Wedemeyer that I thought that before very long relations between our military officers and French military officers would be regularized through the machinery set up under the North Atlantic Treaty. I, therefore, suggested that when, as General Wedemeyer expected, General Billotte [Page 295] asked for his next conference it should be held. Probably before an ensuing conference was requested, plans referred to above might be sufficiently advanced to terminate the meetings with General Billotte in accordance with General Wedemeyer’s desire. I thought that for the present it might worry the French if these were broken off without progress having been made to establish others.
- Gen. Omar N. Bradley, Chief of Staff, U.S. Army, 1948–1949.↩