Eisenhower Library, Eisenhower papers, Whitman file
The Secretary of State to the Embassy in Korea1
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25. Personal from Secretary for Robertson. Have just left White House conference reviewing situation to date, particularly your # 312 representing latest word from you. President authorized you, if you deem appropriate and useful, to transmit following personal message from him to President Rhee:
“Mr Dear President Rhee: Mr. Robertson’s reports encourage me to believe that we can continue to go forward side by side. I hope you share my feeling that recent conversations have clarified many misunderstandings and have brought about an intimacy of understanding and purpose between us which has been too long deferred. I deeply sympathize with your future goals and am sure that they can best be achieved by measures which will not sacrifice the achievements of the past and the friendship and confidence of the American people. This friendship and confidence can, if you will it, be a dependable reliance and support of your people for a future which, in a world of danger, will yet realize your legitimate hopes and aspirations. Throughout these days I have been profoundly sympathetic with you. My own position as the President of the United States has been formulated not out of a lack of sympathy but out of a realization born of hard experience that great goals are seldom realized by desperate measures. Your illustrious place in history as a great patriot is due to patient and sober striving. We want to be allied with you in such endeavors. With every good wish, I am, Sincerely, Dwight D. Eisenhower.”