I understand that you would like to have a brief memorandum on this subject.

When the General Assembly undertook last November to deal with the crisis in the Middle East² it began by urging a cease-fire and recommending that all members of the United Nations should refrain from introducing military goods into the area of hostilities. It then went on to create UNEF to secure and supervise the cease-fire.

How long the United Nations embargo on arms shipments is to be observed may be a debatable point but Canada, as a country which is contributing a contingent to UNEF, has so far avoided releasing significant military equipment to any state in the area, on the theory that it should avoid actions which might seem to encourage an arms race and thus cut directly across the joint efforts of friendly states to prevent a fresh outbreak of hostilities. We understand that the United States and United Kingdom are both still refraining from granting permission for the export of significant military equipment to either Israel or Egypt, considering that both are now amply supplied.

There are several outstanding Israeli requests for permission to import arms and military equipment from Canada. Of these the two most important concern the release of a squadron of 24 F-86's³ and the acquisition of 600 Browning machine guns.⁴

You are familiar with the decision announced on September 21, 1956 to release the 24 jet aircraft in instalments over a period of time on the understanding that deliveries would be suspended or cancelled if the political situation appeared to warrant such action. When the attack on the Sinai Peninsula began and before any of the aircraft had left Canada, automatic action was taken to suspend all shipments of arms to the area of conflict and a permit which had been issued to cover delivery of the first 8 aircraft was subsequently cancelled. Despite one or two Israeli enquiries in recent months no consideration has been given to reinstating the order.

In the case of the Browning machine guns requested early in 1955 the situation is somewhat similar. The release of 200 was permitted over a period of a year. Conditional approval was also given for the release of 600 more at the rate of 60 every three months, to begin on April 1, 1956, on the understanding that the decision might be reconsidered "if the situation should deteriorate seriously in the meantime." Because border violence was resumed and the situation was held to have deteriorated seriously, the government decided in March 1956 to withhold approval for the time being for shipments of the 600 guns to begin. Immediately thereafter the request for jet fighter aircraft was received and attention was focussed entirely upon this until the abrupt cessation of all releases of arms at the end of October. One suggestion was received in April 1957 that shipments of Browning machine guns might be resumed, but for the reasons given in paragraph 3 no action was taken on the suggestion.

Since the United Nations embargo on the shipment of arms to Egypt or Israel has not been breached by the Western states with which Canada has been most closely associated in United Nations efforts to help keep the peace in the Middle East, you may consider that Canada should continue to place emphasis on the importance of the work now being performed by UNEF and the Truce Supervision Organization and refrain from the resumption of arms shipments until it is clear that United Nations purposes would be served by so doing.⁵

J.W. H[OLMES]

¹Note marginale:/Marginal note:
Return to USSEA See note p2 H.B. R[OBINSON] Aug 30. Robinson renvoie ici à sa note en marge du dernier paragraphe de ce document. Robinson refers here to his marginal note in the final paragraph of this document.

²Voir volume 22, chapitre premier, 2^e partie.
See Volume 22, Chapter I, Part 2.

³Voir volume 22, chapitre premier, première partie, section c.
See Volume 22, Chapter I, Part 1, Section C.

⁴Voir volume 21, les documents 556 à 558, et volume 22,
les document 13, 20 et 31.
See Volume 21, Documents 556-558, and Volume 22, Documents 13, 20, and 31.

⁵Note marginale:/Marginal note:
Note Minister said he agreed with policy as described in this memorandum and did not want it changed. H.B. R[OBINTSON]