Editorial Note
On October 4, 1951 Acting Secretary of State Webb transmitted to the Embassy in Turkey in telegram 283 the verbatim text of a British Cabinet Paper approved that day and sent to the Department of State via the British Embassy. This Cabinet Paper dealt with points to be used by the Ambassadors of the United Kingdom, United States, and France in Turkey in securing the cooperation of the Government of Turkey in a joint approach to the Government of Egypt regarding establishment of a Middle East Command. The points included: stress on the need for joint defense of the Middle East area against outside aggression and the establishment of a Middle East Command as the best means of accomplishing such an end; the expressed interest of, and subsequent invitations to, the Governments of Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa to join the Governments of France, the United Kingdom, United States, Turkey, and Egypt in establishing such a Command; direct invitation to Egypt to become a founding member of such a Command structure; the willingness of the United Kingdom to supersede the 1936 Treaty and to retain in Egypt only such troops as were allocated to a Middle East Command should Egypt decide to become a founding member; the necessity for Egypt to provide base rights and other facilities and assistance to such a Middle East Command; that in exchange for the stationing of “Allied” troops on Egyptian soil, Egypt would enjoy a position of “high authority” within the Middle East Command; and, finally, that the detailed organization of the proposed Command and its precise relationship to NATO remained to be worked out. A copy of telegram 283 [Page 203] to the Embassy in Turkey, October 4, 1951 is in Department of State file 780.5/10–451.
In telegram 325 from Ankara, October 6, 1951, top secret, priority, Ambassador Wadsworth reported that he had received telegram 283 and that his British and French colleagues had received similar instructions. As a consequence, the three Ambassadors had called on the Turkish Prime Minister who read the text of the British paper contained in telegram 283 with satisfaction and promised to submit it to the Turkish Cabinet with strongest recommendations that instructions be telegraphed to the Turkish Ambassador at Cairo “to support our govts’ representations there.” The Prime Minister “added that he personally believed suggested approach was ‘only possible one today’ and should be made immed.” Telegram 325 is in file 780.5/10–651.