Letter from Seán Nunan to Frederick H. Boland (Dublin)
(Pol./47)

I desire to report that Sir John Magowan,¹ one of the Ministers attached to the British Embassy here invited me to a stag dinner at his apartment last night - the other guests being Sir Alexander Clutterbuck, British High Commissioner at Ottawa,² Sir George Sansom, Mr. Thomas A. Stone, Canadian Minister here, Senator J.W. Fulbright (Democrat) of Arkansas and Mr. John Hickerson of the State Department, and after dinner, Sir John Boyd-Orr, Director General of the Food and Agricultural Organization.

The after-dinner discussion centred mainly on the conditions in Europe and what should or could be done to revivify that continent and prevent the spread of communism. Senator Fulbright said that, in his view, the solution was a federation of European states and that the American people would not continue much longer to pour their dollars out as they have been doing. He said he would vote for the President's proposal for aid to Greece and Turkey although he was not thoroughly satisfied with it and that the United States would not continue indefinitely to take over Britain's commitments. Sir Alexander Clutterbuck said that so far as England was concerned, he did not think that the English people would wish to be part of the federation and added that he felt that the United States must continue to help England financially. This latter statement did not sit too well with the Senator.

Mr. Hickerson said that 'barring a miracle, the Moscow Conference will be a complete failure.'

All appeared to agree that to have a healthy Europe, there must be a healthy Germany and the consensus was that Germany should be encouraged to produce to capacity, subject to safeguards against the possibility of her being in a position to convert industries for the production of civilian goods into war production.

The great fear, of course, is that communism will take hold of Germany unless something is done soon.

Mr. Hickerson asked me how Ireland would feel about joining a federation of states, and I said that I thought the Six County question should be settled first.