330. Memorandum of a Conversation Between Secretary-General Hammarskjöld and the Counselor of the Delegation at the United Nations (Barco), New York, October 12, 19561
SUBJECT
- Suez: Lloyd, Pineau, Fawzi talks
Following Mr. Hammarskjold’s meeting yesterday evening with Mr. Lloyd, Mr. Pineau and Mr. Fawzi, I met with him to learn the results of the talks.
Hammarskjold said that the afternoon’s discussion had started extremely negatively. Mr. Pineau would discuss only the broadest generalities and no details. Hammarskjold said it could have been the end of the talks, except that none of the others was ready to end them. Pineau finally agreed that the questions had been reduced to ones of implementation and the latter half of the discussion had [Page 698] been very useful. He felt that there had been sufficient substance to make agreement possible between the United Kingdom and Egypt. Pineau’s position, however, remained a question mark. Hammarskjold said that Pineau had the disadvantage of little experience in this forum, little or no knowledge of English, and apparent lack of understanding of the problems involved. He said he, Hammarskjold, could not tell at all what Pineau’s position might become.
Hammarskjold said Fawzi had thrown out the suggestion that the points of substance which had been covered should be referred back to governments. Fawzi said he was prepared to continue the discussions as long as necessary but that if Mr. Pineau had to return to Paris, one way of ending this stage of discussions would be to refer these points to governments. Hammarskjold said no one really knew what ground had been covered on substance and he felt there should be a paper listing these points. He felt reasonably sure that both Fawzi and Lloyd would come to today’s meeting with such a paper. Hammarskjold felt that to refer the points back to governments could lead to what might be a failure in the Security Council but he believed that if this were presented in the right way it could be accepted. The question would arise how long the Security Council could wait. He personally felt a maximum of two weeks should be allowed for government consideration but he had not checked this point with the others. He said that Pineau was not now ready to forego a vote on the Anglo-French Resolution but he thought that Lloyd might well be ready to do so twenty-four hours from now.
The Secretary-General said that as a result of the talks so far, he saw no difficulty over SCUA and its relationship to the operation of the Canal or to arrangements for “enforceability.” He said the Egyptians were willing to accept recourse to a body to make findings of violations and to accept enforceability provisions.
With respect to Israel, the Secretary-General said he felt personally that the Western powers could not get away with the status quo. At the same time, the situation that had been allowed to go on for five years, he felt, could not be allowed to prevent agreement. He had told Fawzi that from his discussions with Egyptians in the past over Israeli transit rights, he felt that the problem then had been to find a proper setting for an arrangement with Israel. He had now told Fawzi that if a large settlement could be found he felt that the Egyptians would have to take agreement on Israel. He said Fawzi had smiled knowingly, without saying anything, but he interpreted his reaction to being one of agreement.
Hammarskjold said that the discussions would continue in his office today at 10:30, and again in the afternoon. He thought that a private meeting in the Security Council would either be very late today, or possibly Saturday morning. He was, I would say, generally [Page 699] optimistic that something would come out of the talks beyond a vetoed resolution or a breakdown.
- Source: Department of State, Central Files, 974.7301/10–1256. Secret. Drafted by Barco.↩