CFM files, lot M 88, box 161, “Lisbon–London Talks, Miscellaneous”

Memorandum by the Secretary of State’s Personal Assistant ( Evans )1
secret

Egypt and the Sudan

The Secretary has had several conversations about Egypt in the last two or three days. This memorandum combines the report of all of them.

Yesterday General Eisenhower telephoned the Secretary to say that he had had a talk with the representative of the King of Egypt, here for King George’s funeral. He is Prince Abdul Moneim, and General Eisenhower talked with him in the presence of a member of the British Government. Prince Moneim said he had had a talk with Mr. Eden. General Eisenhower, in the course of setting forth strongly his view that the present quarrel between Egypt and Britain was a tragic mistake at the time when the Western World should present a solid front against communism, called forth from the Prince what General Eisenhower interpreted as a broad invitation to our government to intervene in the crisis, probably with the hope on the Egyptian part to save face. Prince Moneim had asked directly whether or not our government was willing to invite the British and Egyptians to get together to make a new approach to the quarrel. General Eisenhower said he had not committed himself as to a guess on the part of the U.S. Government on this question, but he was reporting the matter to Mr. Acheson, because he thought it was a very cordial and open invitation.

The Secretary told him that he and Mr. Eden had talked2 about the matter in the light of this approach which was known to them, and would be discussing it again at subsequent meetings.

Today the Secretary had a talk about this matter with Sir Louis Greig, one of General Eisenhower’s aides. Sir Louis said the conversation between Eisenhower and the Egyptian had been stenographic-ally taken down3 and would be sent to the King. It was seemingly a very direct request from the Egyptian Government that the U.S. Government should bring about conversations between the British and Egyptian Governments to settle the matter.

(However, the Secretary mentioned in reporting the conversation that Prince Moneim is not a person who has authority or special knowledge of the matter. The person who has this authority is Ambassador [Page 97] Amr, and the Secretary expressed his opinion that the last thing we should do is get in the middle.)

The Secretary said to Sir Louis that he was aware of the matter and had discussed it with Mr. Eden, who is hard at work on the matter. He said we were very grateful to the General for giving the matter a push and his help. However, he thought the thing to do was to leave it to Eden and to him. The Secretary had reported the Eisenhower approach to Eden.

Mr. Eden has verified that he was putting a great deal of time and effort into the matter. Instructions were being sent to the British Ambassador and talks should start. Eden is having a hard time with the Prime Minister, who thought a great victory had been won in Egypt and should not be frittered away, and with the Cabinet. But Mr. Eden thinks the matter should be settled right away. Eden, himself, had said he wanted to get the regular army troops and infantry out of Egypt and that he was reconciled to having only technical troops in Egypt, and he thought something could be worked out along this line. The Secretary thought that Mr. Eden was vigorously doing everything he could.

With reference to the Sudan, the Secretary had needled Mr. Eden again, and the latter had agreed that something must be done. He was trying to get the Egyptians to send some people to the Sudan for talks to see if they could work out something in the way of an agreement with the Sudanese, so that the British would not be in a position of imposing something on the Sudanese. Eden is quite willing to put down on an agenda for talks between the British and Egyptians the question of “Sudan”, and he and the Secretary agreed that it was important to have it on any agenda. His position on including the Sudan has therefore broken down sufficiently so that there is no danger of the British saying the Sudan must be excluded. However, they have no solution on the Sudanese problem as yet.

  1. A summary of this memorandum was sent as telegram Secto 7, Feb. 16, from London, not printed. (396.1 LO/2–1652)
  2. Presumably Acheson talked to Eden about Egypt near the end of their dinner meeting on Feb. 14; see Acheson’s memorandum of that conversation, p. 40.
  3. No stenographic or other record of the EisenhowerMoneim meeting has been found in Department of State files.