740.00119 Council/1–2346

Memorandum of Conversation30

[Extract]31
Participants: The Secretary
Mr. Vyshinsky
Mr. Bohlen
Soviet Interpreter

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Mr. Vyshinsky then said that in regard to Bulgaria the results had not been so satisfactory and that the Soviet Government had tendered the advice as stipulated in the Moscow agreement, but that the leaders of the Bulgarian opposition, Petkov and Lulchev, had refused to name any candidates unless certain conditions which were not envisaged in the Moscow agreement were met by the Bulgarian Government. The Soviet Government had sent him to Bulgaria to talk to these opposition leaders who had confirmed to him that they would not agree to name any candidate unless new elections were held. He had felt it impossible to accept these conditions which were not envisaged in the Moscow declaration. Mr. Vyshinsky added that he must tell the Secretary that the U.S. representative there, Mr. Barnes, according to his information, was advising the opposition leaders not to accept the Moscow decision, and was publicly stating that the agreement was worthless. He went on to say that the Soviet Government had expected the same free cooperation in carrying out this decision that they had encountered in the case of Rumania, but speaking frankly, the activities of Mr. Barnes could not be received in this light. He said that the Soviet Government found it difficult to understand [Page 61] why a U.S. representative should endeavor to sabotage an agreement which had been reached by the Secretary of State in Moscow, yet this was what he understood was happening in Bulgaria. He said further that he hoped the Secretary would give instructions to Mr. Barnes to cease advising the opposition leaders not to enter the Government except on conditions which were not contemplated in Moscow. The Secretary inquired whether Mr. Vyshinsky’s information might not be incorrect and whether he had personally talked with Mr. Barnes in Sofia. He said he found it difficult to believe that these charges were true, but he would, in any case, look into the matter. Mr. Vyshinsky replied that he had not seen Mr. Barnes, but he said his information was reliable since it came from a variety of sources within Bulgaria, and furthermore the opposition leaders had indicated to him that they understood that the U.S. Government, in fact, did not really desire to see the Moscow agreement carried out. The Secretary replied that he would look into the matter, of course, and if it were found that Mr. Barnes was acting in a manner contrary to the agreement reached by his Government, the situation would be corrected.

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  1. Authorship of this memorandum is not indicated, but it was presumably prepared by Charles E. Bohlen, Assistant to the Secretary of State.
  2. The sections here omitted cover the conversation concerned with the situation in Rumania, and the Iranian complaint against the Soviet Union before the United Nations Security Council. The portion of the memorandum dealing with Rumania is printed on p. 572. The portion of the memorandum relating to Iranian matters is not printed.