Office of the Historian

339. Message From Prime Minister Macmillan to President Eisenhower1

London, March 8, 1958.

Dear Friend: Many thanks for your message of March 42 received through Whitney about the Law of the Sea. We are absolutely at one with you in trying to maintain three miles as the accepted limit, for fisheries as well as for other purposes. The leader of our delegation has already spoken strongly in committee in support of this principle.3 He has made no suggestion of compromise, and I hope that both our delegation and yours will continue to adhere completely to this line.

As you say, however, some concession will probably be necessary, and I am considering with my colleagues the advice we have received from our Delegation at Geneva on the best way of handling this problem. I can assure you that we are as concerned about the security aspects as you. The problem for us is complicated by the probability that we stand to lose out whatever the outcome of the conference, either economically or strategically or, worse still, both. You ask that commercial considerations should not be permitted to control. It is not merely a matter of commerce, but of the livelihood of a large number of the people of this country. Arrangements which denied to our nationals our traditional fishing grounds on the high seas, as a general extension of fishery limits to twelve miles would do, would put in jeopardy the very existence of the most modern part of our fishing fleet, worth 150 million dollars or more, which is of great strategic importance to us in terms of both men and ships. It would also cause hardship and distress in areas where other employment is hard to find; and it would adversely affect our national balance of payments. We have to give great weight to this economic aspect, but we have given no less weight to the strategic and other considerations you mention.

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I will let you have our further views soon, but meanwhile let us both go on fighting as hard as we can for three miles without strings attached.

With warm regard,

Yours ever,

Harold4
  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 399.731/3–1058. Confidential; Presidential Handling. Transmitted in telegram 6362 to London, February 10, 6:32 p.m., repeated to Geneva as telegram 854 eyes only for Dean. Telegram 6362 is the source text.↩
  2. Document 336.↩
  3. For text of the British Representative’s statement in the First Committee on March 5, see U.N. doc. ACONF.13/39, pp. 7–10.↩
  4. Telegram 6362 bears this typed signature.↩