Office of the Historian

UNP Files, Lot 59 D 237

Memorandum of Conversation, by Mr. Ward P. Allen, Adviser, United States Delegation to the General Assembly

secret
[Paris,] January 11, 1952.

Subject: Membership Question

Participants: Mr. C. C. Parrott, UK Delegation
Ward P. Allen, US Delegation

Mr. Parrott told me in confidence of a long conversation he had with Guidotti on this problem. Guidotti is making efforts among the other members of the Security Council to get them to vote in favor of [Page 422] the Soviet resolution proposing the admission of all pending applicants except ROK. According to Guidotti, this is with US blessing or at least acquiescence. Guidotti has the impression that the US will itself abstain on the resolution. He asked the UK to consult with the French in an effort to persuade the latter to vote for the resolution. Mr. Parrott said the UK did not think much of that idea. Parrott raised with Guidotti the problem of the probable Chinese veto because of the inclusion of the application of the Outer Mongolian People’s Republic. According to Parrott, Guidotti said that China would continue in strong opposition until the Chinese saw that the Italians had rounded up sufficient votes for the resolution, at which time they, the Chinese, “would be turned around”. Parrott’s interpretation of this was that Cruidotti expected the US would probably urge China not to exercise its veto. (Parrott urged that the above information be treated in the utmost confidence and nothing be said to Guidotti from which he might receive the impression that Parrott had told us or that we were aware of it).

Present UK instructions are to oppose the Soviet resolution, short of actually vetoing it. So far as the UK Delegation knows, the matter has not been discussed between the US and UK during the Acheson-Eden talks.

I stated that so far as I was aware, we had not yet received instructions from the Department on this matter and I did not know what conversations, if any, had been held with Guidotti. I did not know, therefore, any basis for Guidotti’s apparent belief that the US “blessed” his efforts to obtain votes for the Soviet resolution or that the US would abstain on it rather than vote negatively. I promised to get in touch with Mr. Parrott further on this as soon as we had received firm instructions from the Department.