1. Memorandum From Secretary of State Dulles to President Eisenhower0
With reference to the exchange of students,1 I found out that our current negotiations with the Soviets contemplate for the first year an exchange of 20 and for the second year an exchange of 40. The Soviets had originally proposed that the number be limited to five. By negotiation we got it up to the figures mentioned.
The Soviets also tried to insist that they should be divided into “blocs” of their own selection. We, I understand, obtained it that they should be allocated around at our discretion.
The Soviets like to keep them in groups so that they will watch each other.
In view of this still pending negotiation I would think it doubtful whether we should quickly press for a far larger number which we know in advance will be unacceptable. Perhaps that could come as a second negotiating step after the first one has been put into operation.
- Source: Eisenhower Library, Whitman File, Dulles–Herter Series. Confidential.↩
- According to Dulles’ memorandum of his
conversation with President Eisenhower that day at 8:45 a.m., the President
raised the possibility of a larger exchange of students “in the
interest of accelerating the awakening of Russia.”
Dulles indicated he would “look into the
attitude of the Russians as exhibited in relation to the current
discussions we were having, where I thought that problems had come
up, although on a lesser scale.” (Ibid.,
Dulles Papers, Memoranda of Conversation with the President)
The U.S.-Soviet discussions referred to by Dulles were those initiated in Washington on October 28, 1957, between the Secretary of State’s Special Assistant for East-West Contacts, William S. B. Lacy, and Soviet Ambassador Georgi N. Zaroubin. See Document 2 and Foreign Relations, 1955–1957, vol. XXIV, pp. 267–268.
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