Kashmir Dispute:  U.S. Charg  in Pakistan to U.S. Secretary of State, January 3, 1948

745.45F/1-348 Telegram

The [US] Charg  in Pakistan (Lewis) to the [US] Secretary of State

SECRET - IMMEDIATE - KARACHI, January 3, 1918-noon.

        4. Copies [of] Nehru's note December 22, and Liaquat Ali Khan's reply December 30 furnished me last night by Secretary Foreign Affairs mytel No. 2, January 2. Substance [of] Nehru's note known to Department. Liaquat Ali's reply[,] which runs six long typewritten pages[,] is summary of unsatisfactory relations existing between India and Pakistan and point by point develops thesis that Hindus accepted partition in bad faith, that Pakistan's very existence is the chief casus belli, that GOI has been following [a] calculated pattern to annoy, weaken, and destroy Pakistan, that [the] Kashmir affair is but one incident in [a] long chain [of] such events. Pakistan welcomes reference [of] Kashmir problem to United Nations since this is what GOP has been suggesting throughout as the most effective means resolving mutual differences[,] but expressed disappointment that GOI proposal apparently restricts the reference to single issue [of] Kashmir which now considered by itself would look like a sentence torn out of its context. [The] GOP emphatically repudiates charges of aid and assistance to the invaders. Note states that on [the] contrary[,] GOP has continued [to] discourage tribal movements by all means short of war at serious risk of large scale internal disturbances in Pakistan.

        [The] Prime Minister's note ends with statement that now that Nehru has indicated intention [to] invite intervention [of] UN, a course which GOP has so far ineffectively suggested to GOI for resolving their differences, he takes opportunity [to] invite [to] GOI's attention [to the] main differences standing in [the] way [of] amicable adjustment [of] relations, hopes those differences may be speedily composed[,] and trusts Nehru will agree [to] intervention UN should be invited [in] respect [of] all these matters.

        Delhi informed.

        LEWIS

From: US Department of State. Foreign Relations of the United States, 1948. Volume V, part 1. Washington DC: Government Printing Office, 1975, 269.