227. Circular Airgram From the Department of State to All Posts1

CA-3524

[Here follows a paragraph explaining that the purpose of the paper was to “provide useful background on the complexities of what will continue to be a troublesome problem for the United States in future General Assemblies.”]

SECURITY COUNCIL ELECTIONS

Procedure

Three members are elected to the Security Council annually for a term of two years. Security Council elections are by secret ballot without nominations or discussion. Members customarily announce their candidacies but voting is in no way restricted to announced candidates. United Nations members simply write the names of their three choices on a single ballot. Any country receiving a two-thirds vote (74 on the basis of 109 members and barring invalid ballots and absences) is elected. If all three members are not elected on the first ballot, this is followed by two “restricted” ballots limited, as the results of the first ballot may require, to the two, four, or, conceivably, six members having received the highest vote short of two-thirds on the first ballot. If the necessary number of elections do not result from those two ballots, there is another “unrestricted” ballot, followed if necessary by two more “restricted” ballots and so on ad infinitum until three members are elected. If the election deadlocks, as it has on occasion, a split-term compromise, arranged privately but announced and endorsed publicly, may be necessary to achieve the requisite two-thirds vote.

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Precedents

At the first General Assembly in 1946, it was agreed that the six elective seats on the Council would be allocated geographically as follows: 2 seats for Latin America, 1 seat for Western Europe, 1 seat for the Commonwealth, 1 seat for the Middle East and Africa, and 1 seat for Eastern Europe. This was an equitable distribution at that time when there were only three African members—Egypt, Ethiopia and Liberia—besides the Union of South Africa (eligible for the Commonwealth seat) and only one Asian member—the Philippines—besides China (a permanent SC member) and India (eligible for the Commonwealth seat). Until recently, despite the expanding UN membership, this pattern has continued to enjoy very substantial support, primarily because each area saw in it the best means of protecting its own seats under the original allocation. United States efforts since 1955 to use the seat originally allocated to Eastern Europe to provide for Africa and Asia have, therefore, been only partially successful. This seat was split between the Philippines and Yugoslavia in 1956–57, occupied by Japan in 1958–59, split between Poland and Turkey in 1960–61, and split between Rumania and the Philippines in 1962–63. The only other departure from the “gentlemen’s agreement” of 1946 was in 1960 in the case of the West European seat, when Liberia contested the Portuguese candidacy and Portugal eventually withdrew as part of a compromise reached between the West Europeans and the Africans splitting the term between Ireland and Liberia.

Present Status of Candidacies

Chile, Ireland, and the UAR leave the Council at the end of this year. Brazil is the LA choice to succeed Chile; Norway is the WE choice to succeed Ireland; Morocco is the Arab League choice to succeed the UAR. This latter seat, however, is not an Arab League seat but, as noted above, a Middle East-African seat; and Afghanistan, Iran, Ethiopia, Mauritania, and Nigeria from this general area have also all announced candidacies. Ethiopia has now withdrawn its candidacy. Reports indicate that the UAM states at their recent meeting decided to withdraw the Mauritanian candidacy. Nigeria has specifically stated that it is a candidate for any of the three seats to be filled. The Nigerian Foreign Minister, Wachuku, and other Africans argue that Latin America, with two of the six elective seats on the Council, and Western Europe, with Britain and France permanent SC members, are both over represented on the Council in terms of the present UN membership. Reports from the recent UAM meeting also indicate that in deciding to withdraw the Mauritanian candidacy those states further decided to seek to reach agreement in New York on a single Monrovia group candidate, with Nigeria the most likely choice. If this agreement is reached, there will be [Page 501] four serious contestants for the three seats to be filled this year. There is no indication that the Afghanistan or Iranian candidacies have attracted any substantial support.

[Here follows a section on the relative strength of the candidates.]

Possible Outcomes

On the basis of the above analysis:

1.
Norway could be elected on the first ballot if it gets the Soviet bloc vote or if it gets a sufficient number of neutralist and/or Monrovia group votes.
2.
If, however, the Monrovia group makes a concerted attack on the WE seat and therefore votes as a bloc for Morocco, and the Soviet bloc and the neutralists support this attack by voting for the Monrovia candidate instead of Norway, the end result is likely to be a split-term between Norway and the Monrovia group.
3.
If, on the other hand, the Latin Americans split as between Morocco and the Monrovia candidate and the Monrovia powers either vote as a group for Norway or split as between Morocco and Norway, the end result could be a split term between Morocco and the Monrovia candidate, depending on how the splits were divided.
4.
Morocco could be elected on the first ballot if it gets either all the Latin American or all the Monrovia group votes or a substantial number of both.

Alternatives for the United States

In order to protect the Western voting position on the Security Council, the primary US objective in this selection is to preserve intact the LA and WE seats to be filled, without seriously jeopardizing UAM support of our position on other Assembly issues and with as little damage as possible to our relations with Morocco and the other Arabs and with Iran. If the WE seat, which appears the most vulnerable, is again split, a split-term tradition for this seat will be well on the way to becoming established as it has been for the seat originally allocated to Eastern Europe.

We have taken no position among the various Middle East and African candidates. Iran would undoubtedly be the most helpful on the Council but its candidacy appears to have little chance of success. In the United Nations context, we see nothing to be gained by a vote for Morocco, which has one of the poorest voting records in the General Assembly from our standpoint. Moreover, with Ghana already on the Council, our vote for another Casablanca power against a Monrovia power is certain to be deeply resented by the Monrovia group, whose voting record generally is more favorable to us than that of the Casablanca group and which includes the UAM on whose support we depend heavily [Page 502] on certain vital issues in the Assembly such as Chinese representation. Moreover, a United States vote for Morocco would not appear to have any value in obtaining additional votes for Norway. However, we have acquiesced tacitly in Norway’s deal with Morocco, i.e., 15 WE votes for Morocco in return for 15 Arab votes for Norway, and we are therefore not in a position to undertake any active campaign either against the Moroccan candidacy or in support of any rival candidate.

In this situation, we would appear to have the choice of either voting for Iran as an ally in the absence of any Middle East-African agreement on a single candidate (if the Iranian candidacy is maintained) or voting for the Monrovia group candidate (if it is clear that the group’s objective is not the WE seat and that our vote for the Monrovia candidate would in no way prejudice Norway’s chances). The situation is in fact so delicate that we may wish to keep our vote secret. In any event we are not in a position to make any decision until the intentions of the Monrovia group and trend of developments in New York are clearer.

Tactics

Unless it is clear that any Monrovia group drive is directed toward the Middle East-African seat and not the WE seat, it will be to our advantage to have the elections held as early in the session as possible, thus giving the Monrovia group as little time as possible to organize a drive against the WE seat. Liberia’s successful drive in 1960 was greatly assisted by two facts—1) that Portugal was the WE candidate, and 2) that the elections were held very late in the session.

We will also be in a better position to try to ward off an African drive against the WE seat if we can assure the Africans that there will be one elective seat available for Africa south of the Sahara next year and thereafter. The African drive for a seat this year is more emotional than reasonable since with Ghana already on the Council, Africa south of the Sahara is assured of representation in 1963 whoever succeeds the UAR and with the Philippines succeeding Rumania, the Afro-Asians will hold half of the elective seats on the Council next year, which is roughly equivalent to the proportion they represent of the total United Nations membership.

At the same time, we are sympathetic with the aspirations of the Africans for a designated seat of their own and we have under consideration some scheme of reallocation next year. One possibility would be to try to shift the Commonwealth seat to Africa. Given the present composition of the Commonwealth, the loss of this seat would do less damage to the Western voting position on the Security Council than the loss of the WE or an LA seat. As part of this plan we would also have to try to shift the original East European seat to Asia. In the absence of such a shift and [Page 503] with the Commonwealth seat allocated to Africa, Asian members would have no chance of representation except through the permanent SC membership of China.

Enlargement

Charter amendment is necessary to increase the size of any UN Council and amendments do not become effective until ratified by two-thirds of the members including the five permanent members of the SC. The enlargement question first came before the Assembly in 1956 and was debated at every session thereafter through 1960. While there was generally support for enlargement throughout this period, any Assembly action was discouraged by the consistent Soviet position, reiterated as recently as September 5 of this year, that it would not ratify any amendment of the Charter in the absence of the Chinese Communists. In 1960 it was decided to put the Soviets to the test by Assembly resolutions amending the Charter to increase the number of non-permanent seats on the Security Council and the number of seats on the Economic and Social Council. These resolutions failed of adoption in committee (majority vote) after they had been amended on a Nigerian initiative to provide for the immediate reallocation of existing seats. Nigerian Foreign Minister Wachuku said that to “bring up the question of amending the Charter was simply a delaying tactic”.

The United States continues strongly to support reasonable enlargement of the Councils to accommodate the new members. The extent to which the Russians have succeeded in focusing attention on the Chinese representation issue rather than on enlargement has operated to the disadvantage of the United States. In this situation any United States initiative on enlargement is likely to be regarded as insincere by the Africans. For example, the Ghanaian representative in the 1960 debate equated the United States and USSR position, pointing out that while both supported enlargement “they made it impossible for reasons of national policy”. This of course is a distortion of the facts. It is the USSR, not we, which is making conditions. We have consistently reiterated this in our discussions of the Russian position. However retention of the African support we now have for our position on the Chinese representation issue is crucial to the successful maintenance of this position in the General Assembly. There is a danger that the Africans, to whom the issue of equitable representation in the Council is of greater importance than the question of who represents China in the UN, may reach the conclusion that the quickest and least costly way of obtaining more seats on the Council, would be to pull the rug out from under us on Chinese representation.

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The Department wishes to emphasize that the foregoing is particularly sensitive background material. It is of course obvious that we do not wish to indicate in any way that we are even contemplating that the Africans might make such a move.

Rusk
  1. Source: National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1960–63, 320/10–362. Confidential. Drafted by Virginia F. Hartley on September 24; cleared by John N. Washburn, Louise McNutt, George N. Monsma, James M. Ludlow, Richard Friedman, and Jesse MacKnight; and approved by Woodruff Wallner.