Following from Heeney, Begins: As you know, proposals for the constitution of a "Commonwealth Division" to fight in Korea have been made in a number of quarters and the idea has been bandied about in the press a good deal. We are worried lest the attitude of the Canadian Government toward such a project should be misunderstood. There is already some evidence that it has been, and even some that our views have been distorted.

2. For this reason we would like you to take an early opportunity of explaining to appropriate U.K. Ministers and officials precisely how the Government have regarded this question and the reasons upon which the Canadian attitude is based.

3. Briefly, the Government position is as follows:

(a) it is clearly of great political importance that operations in Korea should have the aspect of United Nations operations to the maximum possible extent. It is in discharge of obligations under the Charter that our troops will be serving and not in any sense as members of the Commonwealth;

(b) we are not in favour of the constitution of a Commonwealth Division, as such, but we are in favour of troops from the various Commonwealth nations serving in the same divisional formations, and this for obvious reasons of efficiency and convenience. In fact, Canadian military representatives are now discussing means of accomplishing this end with the Unified Command and with the U.K. Military Authorities;

(c) we recognize that the main elements in ground forces using U.K. type equipment will be from the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. We would hope, however, that elements from other United Nations similarly equipped and trained (even though they may be very small) could be incorporated in the division in which our troops serve; this solely for the reasons stated in subparagraph (a) above; and

(d) Canadians will be happy to serve alongside their comrades from the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth nations as they have been accustomed to do in the past, and the Canadian Government have decided that they should do so. But we think that this can be accomplished without sacrificing the political advantage to which we know the U.K. and U.S. Governments as well as we ourselves attach great importance, namely, that to be derived from maximum emphasis on the United Nations character of resistance to aggression in Korea.

4. We realize that when, in fact, forces from the various Commonwealth Nations are brought together it may prove impossible to prevent the press and the public from referring to the division in which they serve as a "Commonwealth Division". Nevertheless, for the reasons stated, we believe that nothing should be done to give official standing or currency to such terminology. We trust therefore that the term will not be used officially or even unofficially by the participants. Perhaps the acceptance at an early stage of some such name as "The United Nations First Division! help. We would be glad to have U.K. authorities' views on this. Ends.