UNITED STATES DELEGATION TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE UNITED NATIONS
October 15, 1952 [Handwritten: October 14 ]
MEMORANDUM TO S/S
General Romulo telephoned the Secretary at the Waldorf Astoria last night. The General was very agitated over reports which he had received that the US Government was planning to issue a statement indicating that the visits of Assistant Secretary John Allison, Admiral Radford and other high US governmental officials to Manila were entirely of a routine nature and that no credence could be given to the suggestion that they were there for the purposes which might be related to President Quirino's proposal for Pacific Defense Organization. The General indicated that in accordance with the understanding reached during his most recent call on the Secretary in Washington, the Philippine Government had released information that conversations to be held during the visits would touch upon Pacific defense plans. Romulo said that any repudiation of this in an announcement by the US Government would upset President Quirino and place the Philippine Government in an extremely bad position. General Romulo hoped that the Secretary could look into the matter right away with a view to preventing any such American statement.
The Secretary told the General that the latter was right in his understanding that it was our intention that the Philippine Government should refer to the visits as related to the discussion of Pacific defense and that we had understood the Philippine Government would release information along this line. The Secretary told Romulo that he did not see why the US Government had to issue a statement which would negate the effect which the Filipinos hoped to achieve, and that he would speak to the Department about the matter and call General Romulo back.
The Secretary then spoke with Acting Assistant Secretary Johnson in Washington and said that he did not favor any release which would upset the result which the Filipinos hoped to gain from the information they were putting out regarding the visits. The Secretary said that he thought we should not make any announcement and that when he called Romulo back he would give the General a "cold shower" and tell him that the Filipinos should make no further announcements which could be misconstrued as giving the visits an importance greater than that now attributed to them. Mr. Johnson said that the Department had been considering making an announcement because they thought the Filipinos were completely overdoing the matter and were going considerably beyond the latitude
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which had been implied in our understanding with them. He said that if they kept talking along present lines they would get themselves and us so deeply committed that we would have to bring them back to reality with a thud by announcing that we had no intention of proceeding along the lines set forth by Quirino in his various announcements. The Secretary said that he appreciated that Quirino had to be cooled off, and that he would make this clear when he spoke with Romulo again. He said that he thought that Romulo was frightened enough by the prospect of a US announcement and the effect that would have, to be counted upon to send a message which would make clear the US would make no announcement only if the Filipinos stayed within bounds.
The Secretary spoke with General Romulo later in the evening and told him that there should be no announcements of any kind by anyone. He said he had told the Department not to go ahead with the announcement about which Romulo had spoken, but that Romulo should make clear to his Government that it too should cease any planned activity to give a further build-up to the American visits in Manila. General Romulo assured the Secretary that he would get such a cable off right away.
Copies to: Mr. Johnson Mr. Matthews Mr. Sargeant S/S file