793.94 Conference/240
Memorandum by the Under Secretary of State (Welles) of a Trans-Atlantic Telephone Conversation With the Counselor of Embassy in the United Kingdom (Johnson)
Mr. Herschel Johnson called me on the telephone at seven p.m. by instruction of Ambassador Bingham. Mr. Johnson read to me verbatim from the account of the debate in the House of Commons this afternoon from the printed text available. He said that the official text—Hansard—would not be printed until tomorrow morning but that he regarded this text as accurate.
Mr. Johnson said that the quotations published both by the A. P. and the U. P. as contained in the press reports were entirely inaccurate and misleading. He said that the reports were based upon an exchange which had taken place between Mr. Eden and a member of the Labor Party, Mr. Baker. The Labor member had accused Mr. Van Zeeland as being the “cat’s-paw of the British Government”, alleging that the holding of the Conference in Brussels was done by Mr. van Zeeland at the behest of Great Britain. Mr. Eden in his reply defended Mr. van Zeeland, making it entirely clear that a [Page 140] decision to hold a Nine-Power Conference had been arrived at after the proceedings at Geneva; that thereupon the nations involved had had to reach an agreement as to the time and place for the holding of the meeting, and that subsequently Brussels had been selected and Mr. van Zeeland as the then Prime Minister of Belgium had issued the invitations to the Conference. The Labor member had then attempted to pin down Mr. Eden and to make it appear that Mr. Eden had dictated to Mr. van Zeeland that Brussels should be the meeting place for the conference. Mr. Eden had then replied that Great Britain had not been responsible for the selection of Brussels as the meeting place, but that the United States took the initiative in suggesting Brussels as the meeting place.
Mr. Johnson read to me the debate and insisted that at no place in his speech had Mr. Eden attempted to make it appear as if the United States had taken the initiative in convoking the Conference. The sole reference to any initiative on the part of the United States had been in connection with the capital where the Conference should be held.