315/10–1850: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Embassy in the United Kingdom 1
2011. Please deliver the following as a personal message from the Secretary to Mr. Bevin:
“I fear that the question of the appointment of a Secretary General has now reached a point which threatens to develop an unpredictable [Page 147] situation, with, potentially grave consequences to the United Nations. You have undoubtedly been advised by your delegation of the developments of the past week. You will be aware that at the Security Council meeting of Oct. 12 the Council rejected the Soviet proposal to recommend the appointment of Mr. Modzelewski, Polish Foreign Minister and voted by nine votes in favor; one vote (China) in abstention and one vote (Soviet) against the recommendation of Mr. Lie. The Council then agreed that Ambassador Austin as President of the Council should notify forthwith the President of the Assembly of the fact that the Council had been unable to reach agreement on the appointment of a Secretary General. Such a letter has been sent and published.
On Oct. 17 the Soviet Union called upon Ambassador Austin and requested a private meeting of the Security Council which was held the morning of Oct. 18. The ostensible purpose of the Soviet Delegation in requesting the meeting was to express its view that inadequate opportunity had been afforded to members of the Council, that the Soviet Union believed it possible to reach agreement upon a candidate if further opportunities for consultation were presented and that the appointment of Mr. Lie by the GA would be undesirable under the circumstances, because of the failure of the Security Council to agree upon this recommendation and because of the consequent alleged (illegality) of his position if he should be selected by the Assembly in the absence of a Security Council recommendation.
At the 18th Oct. Security Council meeting, the Indian Delegation proposed a procedure which undoubtedly has been reported to you. The essence of the Indian proposal is that each member of the Council should secretly name two persons whom it proposes for appointment as Secretary General, that the full list of persons so nominated be furnished to each of the permanent members of the Security Council, that the permanent members shall thereupon meet and, after consultation with each other, submit to the Council a revised list containing only such names out of the original list as none of them would vote against. A copy of the revised list would then be furnished to every member of the Security Council and then, ‘after a delay of not less than three days, the Council would proceed to elect from such of the candidates as had not withdrawn in the meantime, the person to be recommended for appointment as Secretary General.2
[Page 148]During the past two days or so I am reliably informed, the Soviet Delegation has been approaching numerous delegations holding out inducements of support for candidates whose selection would be of natural interest to the delegation concerned. For example, the Soviet Delegation appears to have advised a number of Latin American Delegations that it would be prepared to accept any Latin American candidate put forward by a Latin American caucus. The Soviet Delegation, in similar manner, appears to have approached the Indian Delegation with the suggestion that it would be prepared to support an Indian nominee. This afternoon, I am informed, Mr. Vyshinsky suggested to Romulo that the latter would be an acceptable candidate.
I am convinced that these actions by the Soviet Delegation are designed as a maneuver, the primary purpose of which is to defeat the candidacy of Mr. Lie. Some weeks prior to the meeting of the Security Council at which this question was discussed, efforts were made to develop consultations with the Soviet Union regarding the problem. You will recall that Jebb sought an interview with Vyshinsky while the former was President of the Security Council and his approach was not acknowledged. Similarly the U.S. Delegation, on two occasions unsuccessfully sought to develop consultations on this matter with the Soviet Delegation. At the meeting of the Security Council of Oct. 9 and Oct. 12, full opportunity was presented to all members of the Council to propose candidates. The only names offered were Modzelewski and Lie. Ambassador Austin on behalf of the U.S. firmly committed the U.S. to the support of Mr. Lie. The delegations of the UK and France voted for him.
In view of all the developments referred to above and in the light of the obvious design of the Soviet Union in staging these last-minute maneuvers, I believe the time has passed when we can afford to take the risk of re-opening the entire question. The procedure proposed by the Indian Delegation, however well intentioned, would have two inevitable, and to my mind undesirable consequences: (1) From a psychological and political point of view, it would be viewed as nullifying the action taken by nine members on Oct. 12 without any reason or publicly demonstrable justification. This would damage the prestige [Page 149] of the Security Council by stultifying the clearly expressed majority and would seriously damage the prestige of Mr. Lie which that vote implied. I believe these conclusions flow logically from the fact that the first fruit of the procedure suggested by the Indian Delegation would be the deletion by Soviet action of Mr. Lie’s name from the list of candidates. (2) The Indian suggestion would almost certainly result in a blank slate. This would therefore merely produce frustration and thereby also tend to diminish the force of the action taken on Oct. 12.
In the discussions which have taken place between our delegations and the French Delegation, I have understood that there was a consensus of view that there was indeed no practical alternative to the redesignation of Mr. Lie as Secretary General. Nothing that has happened in the past few days has shaken my belief that this remains the case. I am sustained in this view by the transparency of the Soviet maneuvers.
There is little doubt in my mind that the strongly expressed Soviet objection to Mr. Lie must be based in large, and perhaps decisive measure, upon his attitude toward the Korean aggression. All of us have at times disagreed with certain actions of Mr. Lie, and this was to be expected because of the nature of the duties of his office and the difficult period through which he has been serving, but the Soviet Union now seems determined to treat the question of the reappointment of Mr. Lie as a test of the validity of the actions of the UN taken with respect to Korea. The U.S. Delegation advises me that this is well understood by many of the delegations which have been approached by the Soviets and, most significantly, have been understood in this light even by those delegations who might superficially have much to gain by the selection of a candidate from their own country or region.
I can well understand the delicate position in which you might find yourself in the face of a proposal for the selection of a national of a Commonwealth country.
Yet I am convinced that we should hold firm to the choice which has been registered by nine members of the Security Council and which the Soviet Union now seems determined to upset, primarily as a means of demonstrating its power to thwart the majority will of the UN membership. Moreover, unless we hold firm to the choice already registered, we are faced with a completely unpredictable situation with regard to the selection of a new Secretary General and with the certainty that any alternative candidate who might ultimately be selected would be regarded, however unjustly, as a choice brought about by coercion and continuously subjected to the pressure of those who do not hesitate to enforce their own will in the teeth of clear majority sentiment.
[Page 150]I earnestly hope that in the light of all these considerations, you will conclude that your delegation should not vote in favor of the Indian proposal.
I am sending a similar message to Mr. Schuman.”
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Repeated to Paris as No. 2024 with the following introductory sentence:
“Please deliver the following message from the Secretary to Mr. Schuman deleting paragraph 10, page 6.” The reference presumably is to the last paragraph of the quoted text.
Repeated to Quito as No. 73 and to Habana as No. 148 with the following introductory statement:
“The following is text of a personal message from Secy to Bevin and Schuman. Please take up with ForMin along general lines of message but not as personal message from Secy.”
Repeated to Mexico City as No. 377 with the following introductory statement:
“The following is the text of a personal message from Secy to Bevin and Schuman. Please take up with ForMin along general lines of message stressing importance we attach to carrying through proposal to continue Mr. Lie in office. Persistent rumors Lake Success among various delegations re Padilla Nervo as possible candidate.”
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U.S. reaction to the developments in the October 18 (private) meeting of the Security Council was described to the U.S. Delegation on October 19 as follows:
“It was our position to oppose the Indian proposal on the ground that it involved reopening the question and a series of secret nominations. We felt the Russians should make their proposals publicly. We believed the proposed tactic would put Lie out of the running. The present situation was somewhat delicate. We did not know whether we could stop the Indian proposal. The United States and India were in opposition, while Ecuador and Cuba were uncertain. Ecuador had indicated it would propose or support another meeting of the Big Five on this subject.… The personal messages of the Secretary to Bevin and Schuman were being repeated to Cuba, Ecuador and Mexico to discourage Padilla’s candidacy. “(minutes of the 24th meeting of the U.S. Delegation, October 19, IO Files, Doc. US/A/M(Chr)/159)
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