[Released May 14, 1957. Dated April 29, 1957]
Your Majesty:
I received with great pleasure your letter of March 8 and am most grateful for the good wishes which you have sent to me and to my fellow citizens.
I have been deeply interested in the Vice President's enthusiastic report of the hospitable welcome he received in your great country and of the wisdom and statesmanship with which you spoke on matters affecting the common interests of our two countries and the great issues which dominate our times.
I am sure that the Vice President's talks with you and with the Minister of Foreign Affairs, whose ability and spirit of friendly cooperation he also greatly admired, have given new impetus to the further strengthening of the close ties which we have both worked to forge. For our part, we have always desired that our relationship be based on the only defensible basis, that of equality between two sovereign and independent states. It is for this reason that we have instructed our Ambassador at Rabat to inform Your Majesty's Government that the Government of the United States is prepared to participate in conversations on the subject of our military operations in Morocco. I am sure that we can look forward to continued collaboration in examining this and other questions of mutual interest to our two countries.
The importance of our relationship increases my desire to talk with you and to welcome you here in the United States, as I had hoped to do last November. I should therefore deem it a signal honor if you could find it possible to visit Washington in November of this year. I know that my fellow citizens share my desire to receive you in our midst.
I should appreciate Your Majesty's telling me whether you would find it possible to accept this invitation, after which the precise details of your visit could be worked out by the representatives of our two governments so that we can receive you here in a manner befitting the high esteem in which we hold you and the people of your country.
Sincerely,
DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER
Note: At the time this letter was made public the President announced that the Sultan had accepted his invitation, and would be in Washington for a three-day state visit beginning November 25. (The Sultan's formal letter of acceptance, dated June 4, was released on July 18.)
The Sultan's letter of March 8 was in reply to a letter transmitted to him on March 1 by the Vice President when he visited Morocco on the occasion of the first anniversary of Moroccan independence. (The President's letter of March 1 was not released by the White House.)
The Sultan's letter of March 8 follows:
His Excellency Mr. Dwight
Eisenhower
The President of the Republic of the
United States of America
After conveying to you the greetings of Peace, and expressing the hope that you are in constant good health and well-being, we wish to state that we have received your gracious and friendly letter which Mr. Nixon, the Vice President of the United States of America, handed to us. We were deeply moved by the noble sentiments which your Excellency expressed toward our person and the Moroccan people. Such genuine sentiments merit our deep thanks. We also wish to express our gratitude for the kind wishes which your Excellency conveyed to us on the occasion of the first anniversary of the independence of our country.
It gives us great pleasure to seek this opportunity to express once more how much we cherish the age-old relations between the United States of America and the Moroccan Kingdom. These relations have for a long time been based on mutual understanding and friendship. They have been further strengthened by the adherence of our two nations to noble principles and to constant efforts toward the safeguarding of respect for the freedom of nations and the protection of human dignity.
As we express to your Excellency our ardent desire for the continuance of these relations and for the further strengthening of these bonds, we wish to assure you that we shall always hold tenaciously to the view that the identity of purpose between states, based on mutual respect and fruitful cooperation between peoples, is the effective means for the establishment of peace and the spreading of freedom in the world.
We have sought the opportunity of the Vice President's visit to our Kingdom to discuss with him the affairs that specifically concern our two countries. We have, in addition, apprised him of our views on the different problems with which the world is at present preoccupied.
Finally, we send your Excellency our warmest wishes for your continued good health and safety, and for the happiness and prosperity of the people of the United States of America.
MOHAMED BEN YOUSSEF
Dwight D. Eisenhower, Letter of Invitation to His Majesty Mohamed V, Sultan of Morocco. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/233273