799.021/8–2654
The Acting Secretary of State to the Secretary of Defense ( Wilson )
Dear Mr. Secretary: I am enclosing copies of letters received recently by the Secretary from the United States Representative to the United Nations, Ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., and the United States Representative on the Trusteeship Council, Mr. Mason Sears. Both letters refer to discussions in the United Nations of nuclear tests in the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands and both stress the importance of carrying out promises made to the Marshall Islanders affected by the tests concerning compensation for damages suffered from past tests and safeguards against possible harmful consequences of any future tests.
I fully share the views expressed by Ambassador Lodge and Mr. Sears. The United States will certainly be exposed to serious criticism in the United Nations and elsewhere if the promises we have made to the Marshallese people are not kept.
I would appreciate your calling to the attention of the officers concerned in your Agency the importance which the Department of State attaches to prompt fulfillment of these promises. I would also appreciate your informing the Department of State of the steps taken to this end so that our representatives in the United Nations will be in a position to deal effectively with any charges that may be made concerning our actions in the Trust Territory. In this connection, I should like to draw your attention to the fact that while India has not thus far placed on the agenda of the forthcoming session of the General Assembly an item concerning the legality of nuclear tests in the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, it continues to be probable that this matter will be discussed in the Assembly.
I am sending similar letters to the Atomic Energy Commission and the Department of the Interior.1
Sincerely,
- Neither printed.↩