Office of the Historian

349. Telegram From the Embassy in South Africa to the Department of State0

Capetown, March 31, 1960.1

128. Re Salisbury 246 to Department,2 London 4733.3 I completely agree Palmer and Whitney’s4 views expressed reference telegrams. Despite difficulties and tension here, I endorse fully the concept that we must conduct our relations in a way which will permit our exerting a constructive and restraining influence on all sides. It is most important that we not appear to be backing one group or race at the expense of others. It was for this reason I planned include a reaffirmation of US policy towards South Africa in Port Elizabeth speech. Declaration of state of national emergency here, since that time, however, makes any statement whatsoever inadvisable.

I strongly recommend, however, that a statement as suggested by Palmer be made in the near future.5

Crowe
  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 745A.00/3–3160. Confidential. Repeated to Pretoria, Salisbury, and Nairobi.↩
  2. The time of transmission was omitted. The telegram was received at 10:14 a.m.↩
  3. Dated March 26, telegram 246 from Salisbury reported that there were indications that Rhodesians were interpreting the Department’s March 22 statement as “another indication” of U.S. willingness to abandon Europeans in Africa. It commented that the growing danger in the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland was the tendency of Europeans who felt isolated and abandoned to take refuge in xenophobia, and it urged a U.S. statement expressing support for genuine multiracial development. (Department of State, Central Files, 745A.00/3–2660)↩
  4. Dated March 29, telegram 4733 from London endorsed the thinking in telegram 246 from Salisbury. (Ibid., 745A.00/3–2960)↩
  5. Consul General in Salisbury Joseph Palmer 2d and Ambassador to the United Kingdom John Hay Whitney.↩
  6. Telegram 255 to Salisbury, April 4, transmitted extracts from an April 1 statement made by Lodge in the Security Council and said that Satterthwaite would make similar remarks in an April 8 address. (Ibid., 745A.00/3–3160) For text of the former, see American Foreign Policy: Current Documents, 1960, pp. 633–635; for text of the latter, see Department of State Bulletin, May 2, 1960, pp. 686–693.↩