740.00119 Council/10–445: Telegram
The Ambassador in the United Kingdom (Winant) to the Secretary of State
[Received 3:14 p.m.]
10326. Delsec 105. From Harriman.87 In working out further arrangements for the peace settlements I believe we should decide what our interpretation of “drafting” peace treaties is. Are the decisions of the drafting countries to be firm decisions which cannot be changed [Page 558] without agreement of all or are they preliminary understandings to be modified after discussion with other interested countries, each drafter being free to modify its opinion based on additional information obtained from subsequent discussions? It will be recalled that the Russians took the view that Dumbarton Oaks was a fixed agreement and considered that we were committed to force the Dumbarton Oaks decisions on the conferees at San Francisco. This led to considerable difficulty.
I believe we should make it clear to the Russians that our interpretation of “drafting” is that the agreements reached in this process are preliminary understandings, not binding decisions, and that each of the drafting countries is free to modify its position based on opinions expressed at the conference with the other interested nations. It, of course, must be understood that unanimous agreement of the drafting countries must eventually be obtained before final decisions are reached regarding the peace. [Harriman.]
- Ambassador Harriman was on a visit to London.↩