751G.5/4–454: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Embassy in the United Kingdom1
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5179. Eyes only for Ambassador from the Secretary. Please deliver following message from the President to Prime Minister:2 [Page 1239]
Begin text.
“Dear Winston:
“I am sure that like me you are following with the deepest interest and anxiety the daily reports of the gallant fight being put up by the French at Dien Bien Phu. Today, the situation there does not seem hopeless.
“But regardless of the outcome of this particular battle, I fear that the French cannot alone see the thing through, this despite the very substantial assistance in money and matériel that we are giving them. It is no solution simply to urge the French to intensify their efforts, and if they do not see it through, and Indochina passes into the hands of the Communists, the ultimate effect on our and your global strategic position with the consequent shift in the power ratio throughout Asia and the Pacific could be disastrous and, I know, unacceptable to you and me. It is difficult to see how Thailand, Burma and Indonesia could be kept out of Communist hands. This we cannot afford. The threat to Malaya, Australia and New Zealand would be direct. The offshore island chain would be broken. The economic pressures on Japan which would be deprived of non-Communist markets and sources of food and raw materials would be such, over a period of time, that it is difficult to see how Japan could be prevented from reaching an accommodation with the Communist world which would combine the manpower and natural resources of Asia with the industrial potential of Japan. This has led us to the hard conclusion that the situation in Southeast Asia requires us urgently to take serious and far-reaching decisions.
“Geneva is less than four weeks away. There the possibility of the Communists driving a wedge between us will, given the state of mind in France, be infinitely greater than at Berlin. I can understand the very natural desire of the French to seek an end to this war which has been bleeding them for eight years. But our painstaking search for a way out of the impasse has reluctantly forced us to the conclusion that there is no negotiated solution of the Indochina problem which in its essence would not be either a face-saving device to cover a French surrender or a face-saving device to cover a Communist retirement. The first alternative is too serious in its broad strategic implications for us and for you to be acceptable. Apart from its effects in Southeast Asia itself, where you and the Commonwealth have direct and vital interests, it would have the most serious repercussions in North Africa, in Europe and elsewhere. Here at home it would cause a widespread loss of confidence in the cooperative system. I think it is not too much to say that the future of France as a great power would be fatally affected. Perhaps France will never again be the great power it was, but a sudden vacuum wherever French power is, would be difficult for us to cope with.
“Somehow we must contrive to bring about the second alternative. The preliminary lines of our thinking were sketched out by Foster in his speech last Monday night when he said that under the conditions of today the imposition on Southeast Asia of the political system of Communist Russia and its Chinese Communist ally, by whatever means, would be a grave threat to the whole free community, and that in our view this possibility should now be met by united action and not passively accepted. He has also talked intimately with Roger Makins.
[Page 1240]“I believe that the best way to put teeth in this concept and to bring greater moral and material resources to the support of the French effort is through the establishment of a new, ad hoc grouping or coalition composed of nations which have a vital concern in the checking of Communist expansion in the area. I have in mind in addition to our two countries, France, the Associated States, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand and the Philippines. The United States Government would expect to play its full part in such a coalition. The coalition we have in mind would not be directed against Communist China. But if, contrary to our belief, our efforts to save Indochina and the British Commonwealth position to the south should in any way increase the jeopardy to Hong Kong, we would expect to be with you there. I suppose that the United Nations should somewhere be recognized, but I am not confident that, given the Soviet veto, it could act with needed speed and vigor.
“I would contemplate no role for Formosa or the Republic of Korea in the political construction of this coalition.
“The important thing is that the coalition must be strong and it must be willing to join the fight if necessary. I do not envisage the need of any appreciable ground forces on your or our part. If the members of the alliance are sufficiently resolute it should be able to make clear to the Chinese Communists that the continuation of their material support to the Viet Minh will inevitably lead to the growing power of the forces arrayed against them.
“My colleagues and I are deeply aware of the risks which this proposal may involve but in the situation which confronts us there is no course of action or inaction devoid of dangers and I know no man who has firmly grasped more nettles than you. If we grasp this one together I believe that we will enormously increase our chances of bringing the Chinese to believe that their interests lie in the direction of a discreet disengagement. In such a contingency we could approach the Geneva conference with the position of the free world not only unimpaired but strengthened.
“Today we face the hard situation of contemplating a disaster brought on by French weakness and the necessity of dealing with it before it develops. This means frank talk with the French. In many ways the situation corresponds to that which you describe so brilliantly in the second chapter of ‘Their Finest Hour’, when history made clear that the French strategy and dispositions before the 1940 breakthrough should have been challenged before the blow fell.
“I regret adding to your problems. But in fact it is not I, but our enemies who add to them. I have faith that by another act of fellowship in the face of peril we shall find a spiritual vigor which will prevent our slipping into the quagmire of distrust.
“If I may refer again to history, we failed to halt Hirohito, Mussolini and Hitler by not acting in unity and in time. That marked the beginning of many years of stark tragedy and desperate peril. May it not be that our nations have learned something from that lesson?
“So profoundly do I believe that the effectiveness of the coalition principle is at stake that I am prepared to send Foster or Bedell to visit you this week, at the earliest date convenient to you. Whoever [Page 1241] comes would spend a day in Paris to avoid French pique, the cover would be preparation for Geneva.
“With warm regard
“Ike.”
End text.
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The source text indicates that this telegram was drafted by Douglas MacArthur II, Counselor of the Department of State. The file copy is accompanied by a memorandum of June 30, 1965, from MacArthur, then Assistant Secretary of State for Congressional Relations, to Grant G. Hilliker, Deputy Executive Secretary, Executive Secretariat, Department of State, which read as follows:
“In connection with the Department’s Top Secret telegram 5179 to London dated April 4, 1954, which conveyed a message from the President to Prime Minister Churchill, I note that I am listed as the drafting officer and the authorizing officer.
“For the record I should note that I recall that I participated in the preparation of this message with Secretary Dulles and President Eisenhower and that the draft as finally approved by the President, with some modifications and changes, was sent to me in the Department by the White House for transmission very late in the night of April 4 (the message was put on the wire just before midnight). In view of the urgency of the message and the time difference between Washington and London (it was already about 5 a.m. London time), I delivered to S/S the draft which had hand-written modifications from the White House. S/S transmitted the message immediately from the draft which did not, I believe, have any indication of the drafting officials. Subsequently, S/S typed up a clean copy of the message. In this clean copy and since I authorized the message, I was listed as the sole drafting officer whereas both Secretary Dulles and President Eisenhower should also have been listed as they participated in the preparation of the message.”
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In telegram 4367 from London, Apr. 5, 6 p.m., Ambassador Aldrich reported that due to garbles it had only then become possible to send the message from the President to the Prime Minister. (751G.5/4–554)
By memorandum of Apr. 6, the White House informed Secretary Dulles that President Eisenhower had received the following response from Prime Minister Churchill:
“My dear friend,
“I have received your most important message of April 4. We are giving it earnest Cabinet consideration. Winston.” (751G.00/4–654)
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