<--PREV Doc #1965  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  First Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #1967 Document #1966; August 29, 1956 To Herbert Clark Hoover, Jr. Series: EM, AWF, International Series: Burma The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, Volume XVII - The Presidency: The Middle Way Part X: Cracks in the Alliance; May 1956 to September 1956 Chapter 21: "Grave difficulties in the Suez crisis"   Memorandum for the Under Secretary of State (through the Secretary of State): I think you are correct in your belief that I should ask you and some representative of the Defense Department to a conference where we might discuss our future action with respect to Burma.1 I shall leave it to you to arrange with Mr. Shanley the date and the hour, after you have ascertained that a representative of the Defense Department can be available at the same time.2 1 Prime Minister U Nu of Burma had requested aid from the United States, stipulating that Burma would have to maintain its neutrality by making at least a token reimbursment in rice. On June 15 Eisenhower had sent a reply drafted by the State Department stating that U Nu's requests merited "sympathetic consideration" (U Nu to Eisenhower, May 22, 1956; Dulles to Eisenhower, n.d.; Eisenhower to U Nu, June 15, 1956, AWF/I: Burma). For Eisenhower's comments on Soviet aid to Burma see no. 1652. According to Acting Secretary Hoover, aid to Burma had been held up because of opposition from Defense Department officials who believed that Burma was of little military importance. Defense argued that aid should be provided only on a reimbursable basis. The State Department thought that aid was a crucial means of encouraging anticommunism in Burma (Hoover to Eisenhower, Aug. 24, 1956, AWF/I: Burma). 2 The dispute would be resolved at the August 30 meeting of the National Security Council, where Eisenhower ordered that military aid be provided on the basis of loans, for which no actual repayment would be expected (NSC meeting minutes, Aug. 31, 1956, AWF/NSC; see also State, Foreign Relations, 1955-1957, vol. XXII, Southeast Asia, pp. 72-85). Bibliographic reference to this document: Eisenhower, Dwight D. To Herbert Clark Hoover, Jr., 29 August 1956. In The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, ed. L. Galambos and D. van Ee, doc. 1966. World Wide Web facsimile by The Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Commission of the print edition; Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996, http://www.eisenhowermemorial.org/presidential-papers/first-term/documents/1966.cfm <--PREV Doc #1965  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  First Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #1967

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