120. Telegram From the Mission at the United Nations to the Department of State1
541. For the Secretary and Wilcox from Lodge. Re: 15th GA Presidency. Boland (Ireland) candidacy is welcome news.2 We now have in field best possible candidate to beat Nosek (Czechoslovakia).
We must come out soon for Boland so no one can say they made commitment to Nosek because they did not know we were strongly behind Boland, which is what happened in Turkey-Poland contest for SC.
Western Europeans have known of Boland’s intentions for some time and not one of them has opposed him.
British tell us we cannot expect group decision by all WE’s.
USSR obviously well aware Boland’s strength (as can be seen from letter received yesterday from Sobolev (USSR) dated Dec 25 soliciting support for Nosek).3 Soviets can be expected do everything possible to defeat Boland. They might very well calculate that while election Nosek impossible they could get enough commitments for him to reduce majority for Boland to point where issue would come to be regarded as “cold war exercise” and pressures for “compromise” candidate could become impossible to resist. This would be almost as bad defeat for US as would outright defeat of Boland and election of Nosek. In essence this is what happened in SC election at 14th GA: Where Soviets were able establish proposition that nothing can be settled here without US-USSR agreement. We cannot afford let this happen again.
We took initiative in first place in getting Boland into field and we must not drop ball now. If we come out for Boland now no one will be surprised or offended. If we do not, situation will become murky, cause US more trouble with our friends, and give Soviets ready-made opportunities to work against US.4
- Source: Department of State, Central Files, 320/12–2959. Confidential.↩
- Telegram 527 from USUN, December 22, reported that Boland had decided to announce his candidacy. (Ibid., 320/12–2259) Telegram 534 from USUN, December 23, reported that the mission had received a letter from Aiken announcing Boland’s candidacy, and quoted from the letter’s operative paragraph. (Ibid., 320/12–2359)↩
- Not found.↩
- Telegram 602 to USUN, December 30, instructed the mission to coordinate with the British Delegation the U.S. response to Boland’s candidacy, and to discuss it with the other Western European and Latin American delegations. (Ibid., 320/12–3059)↩