Office of the Historian

780.5/10–1851: Telegram

The Ambassador in Egypt (Caffery) to the Department of State

top secret
Cairo, October 18, 1951—3 p. m.

511. When note1 was delivered (remytel 506, October 17)2 Under Secretary Ministry Foreign Affairs, who is ordinarily a reasoned individual, spent half hour tearing MEC proposals apart.

I must remind Dept that our Ambassadors expected this type of reaction, and it was for this reason that we so earnestly recommended that proposals not be put forward at this time (mytel 447, October 10).3

Having torn them to pieces, we cannot hope that Egyptians will give any further consideration to proposals as they now stand. If we are to take advantage of crack in door remytel 506 we will have to come up with proposals which at least will have to be reworded. We must realize that Egyptians can only think of the problem in [Page 231] terms of past history, and cannot see the realities of the present World situation. We must not expect them to consider the problem logically. Sent Dept 511, rptd info London 209, Paris 89, Ankara 71.

Caffery
  1. Contained in telegram 584 to Cairo, October 16, p. 226.↩
  2. Not printed, but summarized in footnote 3, p. 227.↩
  3. Not printed, but see editorial note, p. 205.↩