611.41/6–1753

No. 415
Memorandum by the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern, South Asian, and African Affairs (Jernegan) to the Secretary of State 1

top secret

Subject:

  • Mr. Merchant’s Memorandum of June 15 on US–British Relations2

I share Mr. Merchant’s concern over the fissures existing between British and American policy in the Far East and Near East. I likewise agree that the maintenance of the British alliance is vital.

Mr. Merchant suggests as a solution that we support the British “in the execution of jointly agreed policies in the Middle East” in return for complete British support for our policies in the Far East. I feel sure that Mr. Byroade would agree with me that this would [Page 993] not constitute an acceptable solution from our point of view even if the British accepted it.

For a long time we have been trying to follow policies in the Near East which were “jointly agreed” with the British. The difficulty has been either that, in some instances, we were unable to agree or, more often, that the agreed upon policy proved unsuited to the political climate of the Middle East and therefore accomplished little except to make both the British and ourselves increasingly unpopular. The mere fact of our agreement with the British was bitterly resented by the Middle East governments concerned. Recent policy thinking in the Government therefore has been along the lines of greater rather than less freedom of action for the United States in this field.

If a bargain of the sort suggested by Mr. Merchant were to mean anything to the British, it would have to mean that the United States committed itself to follow the British lead on all major problems, to an even greater extent than has been the case up to now. I am convinced this would destroy all of our influence in the Arab World and Iran and most of it in South Asia. (We do still possess influence in the area, despite the damage done by our past association with the British.)

To tie ourselves to the tail of the British kite in the Middle East at the present juncture, in my opinion, would be to abandon all hope of a peaceful alignment of that area with the West. Unless there is a marked change in British policy the result would be either that both the British and ourselves would be driven out completely or that we would have to maintain ourselves in the area by force at heavy material cost and even greater cost in terms of moral standing throughout the non-European world.

  1. A notation on the source text by O’Connor indicates that it was seen by Secretary Dulles on June 19. Copies of this memorandum were also sent to Smith, Matthews, MacArthur, Bowie, Merchant, and Robertson.
  2. Supra.