Memorandum of Conversation with Secretary of State Dean Acheson and Secretary of the Treasury John Snyder

123 DECLASSIFIED E. O. 11652, Sec. 3(E) and S(D) or (E) 7-23-75 612 Dept. of State letter, Aug - 9, 1973 CONFIDENTIAL Rem NLT. He ; NARS Date 04-21-76 42 ARCHIVES 'NATIONAL RECORDS AND . SERVICE" the April 13, 1949 After luncheon today Secretary Snyder mentioned to me that he was worried about a matter which he understood the State Department was bringing up in the NAC tomorrow. I told him I would look into it and call him back. After meeting with Messrs. Webb, Thorp, Nitze and Knapp, I called Secretary Snyder back and said that the matter included two things which were separate. First, was the question of recommending an increase in the capital authorization of the Export-Import Bank on account of South America, which authorization might or might not be used. This grew out of a statement made by Secretary Marshall at Bogotá. The other question to come up was in connection with the Point 4 program. The President had stressed in speaking of the program the necessity of in- teresting private capital which could go into underdeveloped countries. The queation of how to get such capital - whether by obtaining sufficient security so that the capital would find its way to these areas or by some kind of govern- ment guarantee of the exchange risk, etc. - was referred to the NAC since the State Department is not equipped to deal with it alone. It is therefore the staff of the NAC which is proposing a recommendation tomorrow and not the State Department alone. With reference to our action on this, I said that the papers were only finished today and had not been discussed with me before lunch. I therefore had had no time to think about the matter and since Secretary Snyder was disturbed about it, I thought the best course would be for the State Department representatives to try not to have the NAC meeting make any final decision. They should ask that the matter be explored further, particularly with reference to any alternatives. I suggested to Mr. Snyder that perhaps he and the President might talk about the matter, so that we could find out whether the President really wanted some- thing like a guarantee developed. If he does not want such a guarantee the matter should be stopped. If he does think it necessary it could then be sent back to the NAC. I assured Mr. Snyder that I had no intention of endorsing a recommendation to increase the lending authority of the Export-Import Bank. Mr. Snyder expressed relief at the course suggested and thought that it would be helpful if the State Department representatives would have the NAC meeting simply discuss the CONFIDENTI IAL