that such a delegation would spark a rapprochement in Vietnam and would delay debate and condemnation by the Assembly until the mission had tabled its report. Privately he asked the Americans to tell Thích Trí Quang that he would not do anything to harm the Buddhist's cause. Bửu Hội also visited the U.S. Department of State in Washington where he was given a mixed reception. Harlan Cleveland, the assistance secretary for international organization affairs thought that his "sophisticated" plan and his stature as an intellectual and diplomat would boost his cause. Undersecretary Averell Harriman and Assistant Secretary Roger Hilsman, well-known Diệm critics, were less enthusiastic. Bửu Hội's attempt to break the deadlock in relations since the pagoda raids failed to convince Harriman, who removed his hearing aid when Bửu Hội suggested the pro-Diệm former U.S. ambassador Frederick Nolting still had a positive role to play. When Hilsman criticised the treatment of the Buddhists, Hội asserted that the movement had become political and that the Buddhists had forced Diệm into a fight for survival. Hội parried U.S. calls for Diệm to remove Nhu, regarded as the corrosive influence in South Vietnam, from power. He asserted that Nhu was a great talent but noted that a Prime Minister should be appointed. At the UN, the Ceylon delegate had begun to push for a resolution expressing serious concern about "the continuing violation of human rights in Vietnam". Since South Vietnam was not a member and had no right of reply, Bửu Hội and his team lobbied African and Asian countries behind the scene. Hội was also the South Vietnamese ambassador to six African nations. The result was that a polemical address by Ceylon on 7 October did not garner any support. A Soviet Union threat to use the International Control Commission to investigate the South's domestic affairs never materialized, either. The General Assembly voted unanimously to cut short the debate and accept the invitation to send a fact finding mission. Hội had managed to avert censure of his country and an unwanted debate on the role of the U.S. there. Lodge expressed disappointment at why the U.S. delegation helped to avoid a debate that would have condemned Diệm. Despite Hội's assurances that the mission would be free to move around the country and was not a stalling device, Lodge was adamant that Diệm would never allow them to see anything unfavourable. Atomic Energy