Foreign Relations of the United States, 1955–1957, Suez Crisis, July 26–December 31, 1956, Volume XVI

327. Memorandum of a Conversation Among the President, the Secretary of State, and the Under Secretary of State (Hoover), White House, Washington, October 11, 1956, 9 a.m.¹

Washington, October 11, 1956, 9 a.m.

We discussed at some length the Suez situation. I reported on the state of affairs at the United Nations, and my information as to the developments which had occurred at the meeting at Hammarskjold’s office of Lloyd and Pineau with Fawzi.² It was, I thought, quite apparent that Lloyd was groping for some practical solution which would measurably give international assurance that the Canal would be safely and impartially operated, that Pineau was unsympathetic and that the Egyptians were somewhat evasively disposed to move toward what might be an acceptable solution.

The President mentioned that he had had a talk with Haley of The London Times³ and had expressed to him the feeling that we should be satisfied with some form of international contact that would reasonably assure the operation of the Canal.

I outlined to the President the points which I had made in my speech before the Security Council⁴ and the distinction between” principles” and “mechanisms” with which the President heartily agreed. He said he might make this point if the occasion offered at his forthcoming press conference. The President again expressed his view against military operations. I told him about my statement to Lloyd at the Pineau luncheon⁵ to the effect that the British had had their chance at a military solution when they were lawfully at the Suez Base with their 88,000 military personnel.

They then were lawfully there under a Treaty and with ample force and felt they could not stay without unduly extending themselves. I could not see why they should go back under more adverse conditions to a situation which they found intolerable under relatively favorable conditions.

The President spoke of various ideas he had had⁶ and which I said we were studying. I thought some of them we were actually carrying out. I said that if things got into a real crisis, we might want to call on him to make some move.

I explained the present jealousy between Menon and Hammarskjold and their competition for the role as intermediary in the present situation.

I said it looked that the most hopeful prospect was there might be on the one side the Users’ Association collecting dues and dealing with the Egyptian Canal Authority, that the Canal Code would be adopted to handle practical matters and that the Users’ Association would have “sanctions” because they could cut off all or substantially all of the dues if there were a violation of the Code.

The President asked about the alleged “differences” between the British and ourselves, and I said I was not aware of any, and on the contrary had been assured by both Lloyd and earlier by Eden of their great appreciation of my sticking with them. The President said he might mention this at his press conference.

I showed the President a draft of acknowledgment of Eden’s letter of October 1.⁷ The President glanced over it, and said it seemed to him to be satisfactory and that he would write Eden along those lines.

The President mentioned the tanker matter, and Mr. Hoover and I said that we were discussing this with Mr. Flemming.⁸

JFD

1. Source: Eisenhower Library, Dulles Papers, Meetings with the President. Secret; Personal and Private. Dulles had returned to Washington on October 10 at 7 p.m. (Dulles’ Appointment Book; Princeton University Library, Dulles Papers)
2. At 8:45 a.m., October 11, Lodge briefed Dulles over the telephone regarding Hammarskjöld’s meeting with Lloyd, Pineau, and Fawzi on October 10 (see supra). (Memorandum of telephone conversation by Bernau, October 11; Eisenhower Library, Dulles Papers, General Telephone Conversations) No indication has been found that Dulles had received the British report of the meeting which had been delivered to the Department of State at 8 that morning (see footnote 2, supra).
3. Sir William Haley, editor of The Times (London). Eisenhower met with him on October 10 at 2:30 p.m. (Record of the President’s Daily Appointments; Eisenhower Library)
4. See footnote 2, Document 317.
5. See Document 321.
6. Reference is to Eisenhower’s letter to Hoover, October 8, Document 311.
7. See footnote 1, infra.

8. Attached to the source text is a draft of a proposed memorandum from the President to Flemming. For the final version of the memorandum, sent to Flemming on October 12, see Department of State Bulletin, October 22, 1956, pp. 619–620. In the memorandum, the President directed Flemming to bring together members of the National Petroleum Council to meet with the heads of the State, Treasury, Defense, Interior, and Commerce Departments to consider plans that would help assure the efficiency and adequacy of distributing petroleum supplies in the Free World. The plans were to provide for building in U.S. shipyards a sufficient number of large tankers to help supplement existing means of distribution and, if necessary, to help serve as an alternative means of transportation of crude oil from the Middle East.

   Dulles left for New York by air at 12:12 p.m. that afternoon.