711.00111 Armament Control/2495: Telegram
The Secretary of State to the Minister in Thailand (Grant)
54. On October 4 the Thai Minister called at our request. An officer of the Department8 informed him that, due to the needs of our national defense program, this Government was being obliged to conserve for its own uses various commodities; that this country’s needs were steadily expanding; that as a result of this general situation the Government had had to cancel licenses previously granted for export of certain commodities; that on October 3 the Government had taken steps to stop the export of five Fairchild training aircraft which were ready for shipment to Thailand; that after much consideration decision had been reached last night to permit export of this particular shipment; that this decision had been arrived at reluctantly due to our own acute needs; and that we could of course give no assurance that other shipments of arms and munitions applications for which had already been granted would be permitted to leave American territory. The Minister expressed appreciation of this Government’s action in permitting export of the five Fairchild training aircraft and said that he of course realized that under a license system licenses were subject to cancellation.
- Maxwell M. Hamilton, Chief of the Division of Far Eastern Affairs.↩