of State George Shultz declared: "Israel will never negotiate from, or return to, the lines of partition or to the 1967 borders." Secretary of State Christopher's letter to Netanyahu states: "I would like to reiterate our position that Israel is entitled to secure and defensible borders, which should be directly negotiated and agreed with its neighbors." A key part of the case in favour of a "some territories" reading is the claim that British and American officials involved in the drafting of the resolution omitted the definite article deliberately in order to make it less demanding on the Israelis. As George Brown, British Foreign Secretary in 1967, said: Lord Caradon, chief author of the resolution, takes a subtly different slant. His focus seems to be that the lack of a definite article is intended to deny permanence to the "unsatisfactory" pre-1967 border, rather than to allow Israel to retain land taken by force. Border rectification by mutual agreement is allowed: Arthur J. Goldberg, another of the resolution's drafters, argued that Resolution 242 does not dictate the extent of the withdrawal, and added that this matter should be negotiated between the parties: Mr. Michael Stewart, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, in a reply to a question in Parliament, 9 December 1969: "As I have explained before, there is reference, in the vital United Nations Security Council Resolution, both to withdrawal from territories and to secure and recognized boundaries. As I have told the House previously, we believe that these two things should be read concurrently and that the omission of the word 'all' before the word 'territories' is deliberate." Mr. Joseph J. Sisco, Assistant Secretary of State, 12 July 1970 (NBC "Meet the Press"): "That Resolution did not say 'withdrawal to the pre-June 5 lines'. The Resolution said that the parties must negotiate to achieve agreement on the so-called final secure and recognized borders. In other words, the question of the final borders is a matter of negotiations between the parties." Mr. Sisco was actively involved in drafting the resolution in his capacity as Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs in 1967. President Lyndon B. Johnson: U.S. position On June 19, 1967, President Johnson declared the five principles, including land for peace, that he believed comprised the components of any United Nations settlement of the Middle East crisis. He pledged the U.S. Government would "do its