CURRENT INTELLIGENCE BULLETIN - 1953/05/19

• Document Type: SPECIALCOLLECTION
• Collection: Current/Central Intelligence Bulletin Collection
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 02901113
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: July 15, 2019
• Document Release Date: July 22, 2019
• Publication Date: May 19, 1953

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SECUR INFORMATION
19 May 1953
Copy No.
CURRENT INTELLIGENCE BULLETIN
DOCUMENT NO
NO CHANGE IN CLASS.
i DECLASSiFIED
CLASS. CHANCED TO:
NEXT REVIEW DATE:
AUTH: HC 70-2
DATE.
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IS
REVIEWER:
Office of Current Intelligence
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o
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY
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SECU INFORMATION
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URITY INFORMATION
SUMMARY
SOUTHEAST ASIA
French air supply effort in Indochina criticized (page 3).
2. French appointment in Indochina may aggravate Vietnamese
mistrust (page 3).
EASTERN EUROPE
\,,20.'"Comment on Tito's anti-Italian speech of 17 May (page 4).
WESTERN EUROPE
Auriol favors East-West conference without agenda (page 4).
5. Letourneau plans to resign from French cabinet (page 5).
6. France opposes embassy status for high commissions in Bonn
(page 5).
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SEXJRITY INFORMATION
SOUTHEAST ASIA
1. French air supply effort in Indochina criticized:
Airfield runways at the French posts of Luang3.3(h)(2)
Prabang, Xieng Khouang, and Lai Chau are
unsuitable for even critical landings by C-119
aircraft, and the one at Na San is barely marginal,
The planes which have been dropping supplies
have averaged about 10,000 pounds per flight. This could be increased
by 3,000 pounds by shifting operations from the limited facilities of the
Hanoi airfield to one in the Haiphong area.
Further hampering the air supply effort is the
French command's order limiting planes to 65 hours flying time per month,
- whereas their minimum capability is 120 hours.
Comment: The French have often been criti-
cized for inefficiency in their air operations in Indochina. The heavy
rains which have now begun are expected severely to limit or entirely
to curtail transport landings at the several isolated French outposts,
making troops there largely dependent on air drops for supplies.
2. French appointment in Indochina may aggravate Vietnamese mistrust:
The American consul in Hanoi reports that
Minister Letourneau has approved the appoint-
ment of a personal enemy of the present Viet-
namese governor of Tonkin as France's repre-
sentative in that area. The official in question is regarded by his own
colleagues in Tonkin as totally incompetent.
Observing that the appointment was apparently
based on seniority, the consul points out that the United States, as well
as France and Vietnam, cannot afford an added element of friction in
French-Vietnamese relations in the wake of the recent French military
reverses and the piaster devaluation.
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EASTERN EUROPE
3. Comment on Tito's anti-Italian speech of 17 May:
President Tito's sharp attack against Italy
in his speech on 17 May foreshadows a tougher Yugoslav attitude on
Trieste. His renewed claim to the city of Trieste and his threat to
defend Zone B by force of arms if necessary demonstrate Yugoslavia's
unwillingness to reach a compromise solution with Italy along a general
ethnic division compatible with Italy's minimum demands.
This outburst may have been designed partly
to divert popular attention from pressing economic problems to a highly
unifying international issue. It also reveals Tito's uncertainty over sus-
pected "big-power" plans to influence the Italian elections next month at
the expense of Yugoslavia.
WESTERN EUROPE
4. Auriol favors East-West conference without agenda:
French president Auriol told Ambassador
Draper on 15 May that he favored four-power
talks without specific prior conditions and
without an agreed agenda. He feels that the
raid" to talk with the Russians at any time on
West s
this basis.
Comment: Auriol is a leader of the Social-
ist Party, which has been calling for four-power talks. Despite the
constitutional limitations on the powers of the president, he presides
over cabinet meetings and wields a strong personal influence on French
policy.
While French official thinking has opposed
four-power talks unless certain conditions are fulfilled beforehand,
Churchill's 11 May proposal received strong public and parliamentary
support. The Foreign Affairs Committee of the Assembly on 13 May
unanimously passed a resolution calling on the government to press
for a four-power conference as soon as possible.
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5. Letourneau plans to resign from French cabinet:
Minister for the Associated States Letourneau 3.3(h)(2)
told the American embassy in Saigon on 16 May
that he planned to resign on his return to Paris
this week. He apparently felt that his resigna-
tion might cause the downfall of the Mayer cabinet.
Angry at the failure to consult him on the devalu-
ation of the piaster, he said he had told Premier Mayer that the government
seemed to be formulating policy on the advice of neutralist elements which
had consistently advocated withdrawal from Indochina.
Comment: While Letourneau's resignation
would be greeted with satisfaction in many French political circles, it
would cause the government considerable embarrassment, particularly
if he carried out his threat to attack its Indochina policy in the National
Assembly.
6. France opposes embassy status for high commissions in Bonn:
According to a French foreign ministry sp0kesm3 3(h)(2)
France cannot accept the American proposal to �
raise the Allied high commissions in Bonn to
embassy status and to establish a mixed Allied-
German board to review the sentences of war criminals.
Alleging that the American high commissioner has
intimated that both the German mission in Washington and the US high com-
mission in Bonn might be raised to embassy level, the spokesman declared
that this was a matter for the three occupying powers to decide, and not the
United States alone.
Comment: Chancellor Adenauer had suggested
while in Washington that the Allies give their high commissions embassy
rank following West German parliamentary ratification of the EDC treaty.
He said that some such concession prior to the September elections was
of the utmost importance as a sign of Germany's new status.
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