<--PREV Doc #225  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  First Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #227 Document #226; June 3, 1953 To Hamilton Fish Armstrong Series: EM, AWF, Name Series The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, Volume XIV - The Presidency: The Middle Way Part II: Settling into "the long pull"; May 1953 to August 1953 Chapter 4: Striving for Unity   Dear Ham:1 Thank you very much for your letter; more especially for your fine memorandum, which I am going to furnish to State, C. D. Jackson, and the C.I.A.2 I am glad to have the names you suggested, although right after you visited me the other day I found that an individual had already been selected for the exact place we had in mind.3 I truly appreciate your kindly thoughtfulness and your cooperation. With warm personal regard, Sincerely 1 Armstrong edited Foreign Affairs, the quarterly journal of the Council on Foreign Relations. Eisenhower had joined the council as Columbia University president and retained an interest in its work (see Galambos, Columbia University, no. 269, and Galambos, NATO and the Campaign of 1952, nos. 150 and 343). Armstrong had met Eisenhower the morning of May 27, after visiting Belgrade, Yugoslavia (see the Chronology). 2 On June 1 Armstrong had written Eisenhower (AWF/N) with "some brief and rather frank notes" on several subjects the two men had discussed at the White House (see below). He enclosed a memorandum on Albania and the future of the Soviet satellites in Eastern Europe. He believed that a solution to the Trieste problem might follow the upcoming Italian elections "if outside Powers bring strong pressure on both sides equally" (for background see Galambos, NATO and the Campaign of 1952, no. 808; and for recent talks between Secretary of State Dulles and the Greek leadership on Trieste see State, Foreign Relations, 1952-1954, vol. IX, The Near and Middle East, pt. 1, p. 155). The fact that certain American propaganda activities in Albania originated in Italy, Armstrong argued, associated the United States with Italian aspirations and alienated Greece and Yugoslavia. Armstrong reported Tito's view that the Soviet attitude toward Yugoslavia provided the "crucial test" of its sincerity in any East-West thaw. In his conversations with the Yugoslav leader, Armstrong had stressed the willingness of the United States to accept freely chosen Communist governments in Eastern Europe as long as such regimes were independent of Moscow and its imperialism and showed a "cooperative spirit toward the Western democracies." He asked, "Have we, in fact, made up our minds as yet whether our aim is to detach the satellites from Russia or to settle in advance what their future forms of government are to be?" "We should," he said, speak less of "`liberation' (which implies action on our part that seems to involve the risk of war) and more of our determination to ensure eventually that the Soviet-dominated peoples will have a free choice of the sort of government they want." This same day Eisenhower sent copies of the Armstrong memo to CIA Director Allen Walsh Dulles, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, and to psychological-warfare adviser Jackson, along with excerpts from the cover letter noting (a) Tito's disappointment that recent British pledges of support for Yugoslavia went no farther and (b) Armstrong's recommendation that the Bermuda conference produce a simple statement supporting the right of Eastern European countries to self-determination. 3 Eisenhower had asked Armstrong for recommendations for U.S. Ambassador to Yugoslavia, and the editor had suggested several possible candidates. In late July the Senate would confirm James W. Riddleberger, a career Foreign Service officer, to that post (New York Times, July 4, 18, 31, 1953). Bibliographic reference to this document: Eisenhower, Dwight D. To Hamilton Fish Armstrong, 3 June 1953. In The Papers of Dwight David Eisenhower, ed. L. Galambos and D. van Ee, doc. 226. 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/226.cfm <--PREV Doc #225  |  Memorial Commission Home Page  |  First Term Table of Contents  |  Presidential Papers Home Page  |  Doc#  |  NEXT--> Doc #227

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