Cablegram 1250 WASHINGTON, 21 December 1944, 8.11 p.m.
SECRET
Your 2077. [1]
1. I have consulted Berendsen with regard to this telegram and he has agreed to cable to his Government for instructions. He and I both think that it is possible that the President will call the Council together but consider that the ground should be carefully explored beforehand to see under what conditions it will meet and that it would be premature to make a formal approach until this is done.
2. While the President may very well call a meeting of the Council it is exceedingly doubtful whether he would treat it seriously or would allow it to be made a vehicle for decisions on the important points you mention and if he did not the effect might merely be to sidetrack us.
3. I am strongly of the opinion that we should seek information as to the Allied policy and assurances on the points you mention. I have a personal preference for approaching this through diplomatic channels rather than in the Council, the proceedings of which are not sufficiently private but if you so instruct me I will work wholeheartedly for the calling of the Council.
4. With regard to paragraph 7 the President’s report you refer to is apparently from New York Herald Tribune which does not mention me at all. This says- ‘It was learned that the new Australian Ambassador, Herbert Evatt, had no instructions from his Government regarding the Council.’ No statement of this kind has been given by me to the Herald Tribune representative or to any other journalist nor has any question been put to me on it and the report is obviously fishing for some statement.
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1 Document 377.
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[AA:A1066, P45/148/1]