Foreign Relations of the United States, 1951, Europe: Political and Economic Developments, Volume IV, Part 2

No. 815

Secretary’s Memoranda, lot 53D444

Memorandum of Telephone Conversation, by the Secretary of State’s Personal Assistant (Evans)¹

[Washington,] October 16, 1951.

Participants:	Secretary Acheson
	Ambassador Kirk

Secretary Acheson telephoned Ambassador Kirk this afternoon and received from the Ambassador a report on his talk with Mr. Gordon Gray. The Ambassador said that he, the Ambassador, had been interested and responsive but had made no commitments. He reported that Mr. Gray had said he felt he must leave by January 1 and that a month was the minimum.²

The Secretary said that in his talk with Mr. Kennan he had found that the latter was anxious to do what the Secretary requested if he could work it out.³ He did not think he could leave the Institute before March. He could go over and present his credentials and come back shortly afterwards to pick up his family. But he would like a week or ten days to think the matter through.⁴

The Secretary said he thought, in view of the delay if Mr. Kennan accepted, that Ambassador Kirk should continue as Ambassador and he thought the present arrangement, by which Ambassador Kirk stayed in Paris and could, if anything important came up, be back in Moscow within two days, was a good arrangement. The Secretary said, therefore, if he were to decide the matter today, he would strongly urge that Ambassador Kirk not do the other job, but should go to Paris. If within a week or ten days Mr. Kennan decides he will not accept the position, then the Secretary’s view about Mr. Kirk’s own position might change. The Secretary said that the other proposition which had been put up to Mr. Kirk would not be the last opportunity which would turn up where the Ambassador could be of great service to the country, and the Secretary was under the impression that Mr. Kirk was not keen about it in any event. Ambassador Kirk said that was true.

Ambassador Kirk and the Secretary left the matter that they would keep in touch and that Ambassador Kirk would inform Miss Evans where he could be reached at all times. The Secretary promised that he would talk with Ambassador Kirk personally or over the telephone before he and the Ambassador left the country.⁵

B[arbara] Evans

1. Attached to the source text is the following note from Evans to Special Assistant Battle:

   “I did not understand the first part of the conversation (where Kirk was reporting), and the first paragraph is unclear. If you can deduce what may be wrong with it, please change.

   “Should this get any distribution?”

   Additional notes attached to the source text indicate that this memorandum was seen by Under Secretary Webb, Humelsine (A), McWilliams (S/S), and Barnes (S/S).

2. No further information has been found in Department of State files to clarify this paragraph. The reference may be to Gray’s projected departure from his post as Chairman of the Psychological Strategy Board.

3. Secretary Acheson made the following record of one of the items he discussed with President Truman at their meeting on October 6:

   “Item 6. Ambassador to Moscow

   “I told the President that, in accordance with his authorization to me some time ago, I had been discussing this matter with Mr. Kennan. I recalled to the President that he had at one time mentioned Admiral Connolly to me, but had authorized me to go ahead with Mr. Kennan. I asked whether there had been any change in his wishes in this regard. He said not at all, and that I was to proceed with Mr. Kennan.” (Secretary’s Memoranda of Conversation, lot 65D238)

4. For Kennan’s own recollections of his exchanges with Secretary Acheson in the autumn of 1951 regarding the ambassadorship to the Soviet Union, see Kennan, Memoirs, vol. II, pp. 105–106.
5. No record has been found of any further exchanges between Acheson and Kirk prior to the Secretary’s departure for Europe on October 25 as head of the U.S. Delegation to the Sixth Session of the U.N. General Assembly.