493.919/7–2453: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Embassy in India1
niact
87. Re Colombo’s 27 repeated New Delhi 3.2 New Delhi’s 174 repeated Columbo 5.3 Although facts not yet clear, information so far received your telegrams it appears that India Rare Earth Limited is exporter in this case and that shipment was permitted by Indian Government. If these facts verified, situation extremely grave.
Note Ceylon last stop prior Taku Bar. Unless overriding objection, Embassy should immediately approach GOI re offloading cargo at Colombo on basis Indian policy such materials not exported to any destination and license invalid. View ETD Mickiewicz and seriousness problem GOI should act immediately. Embassy should emphasize critical nature situation since US executive branch has no discretion in cases involving this material (see PL 213).4 Embassy may wish bring matter attention Deshmukh.
- This telegram was also sent niact to Colombo as telegram 21, and it was repeated for information to London as telegram 454.↩
- Not printed; the Embassy in Colombo in telegram 27, July 24, informed the Department that the Polish vessel SS Mickiewicz was in Colombo loading 2,600 tons of rubber for shipment to Communist China, that the cargo included two tons of thorium nitrate loaded in Bombay, and that the ship’s next port of call was Taku Bar, China. (493.919/7–2453)↩
- Not printed. (493.919/7–2453)↩
- The reference is to the Mutual Defense Assistance Control Act, known as the Battle Act (after its sponsor, Representative Laurie Battle of Alabama), which was signed into law on Oct. 26, 1951 as Public Law 213. For the text, see 65 Stat. 644. Under terms of the Battle Act, any nation trading embargoed materials to the Soviet Union and its satellites, including Communist China, would have all United States military, economic, or financial assistance terminated. One of the strategic materials embargoed under the act was thorium nitrate.↩