Foreign Relations of the United States, 1949, The Near East, South Asia, and Africa, Volume VI

890H.24/2–1149

Memorandum of Conversation, by Mr. Richard S. Leach of the Division of South Asian Affairs

secret

[Washington,] February 11, 1949.

In the course of a conversation at the Department today Mr. Aziz² again referred to the urgency of Afghan need for military equipment. He said that he had been asked to do this by the Afghan Ambassador.³

Mr. Aziz again raised the question of the priority position of Afghanistan among the various claimants for US military supplies and was told that no definite information was available on this point, but that if any assistance at all could be given by the US it would be on an extremely modest scale. In response to a query by Mr. Aziz as to whether there was a continuing interest by the US in Afghan security the writer indicated that there was such a continuing interest; that the US would make a sympathetic study of specific requirements when these were brought to its attention; that it appeared currently that this study could not go forward until the Department has received comments from the US Military Attaché at Kabul on the Afghan defense proposals, which are understood to be in the course of transmission.⁴ When these comments are at hand the Department will study them, and endeavor to obtain the views of experts who can bring together a knowledge both of Afghan military units and of equipment of corresponding US units. It may then be possible to define in terms of American standards what would be a reasonable organization for internal security in Afghanistan and what its equipment ought to be.

Mr. Aziz urged that this step be taken as soon as possible so that Afghan counterviews might be discussed. He reiterated the Afghan intention to equip itself for purposes of internal security only and indicated that the present state of the Afghan forces was critically weak.

Although stressing the non-aggressive nature of Afghan military plans, Mr. Aziz said it was the hope of Afghan officials that the equipping of the armed forces could be carried out in such a way as to integrate these forces into plans for operations by guerrilla units in the event of outside attack.

2. Abdul Hai Aziz of the Afghan Economic Mission at Washington, First Undersecretary of National Economy.
3. Sardar Mohammad Naim.
4. Final action on the Afghan request for military equipment was delayed through 1949. On July 27, 1949, in telegram 117 to Kabul, not printed, Secretary of State Acheson instructed the Embassy that in view of the dispute between Afghanistan and Pakistan over the North West Frontier Province and Tribal Areas, it should leave the initiative on the final arms list to the Afghans (890H.24/5–3149).