Although British ambassador to Ankara, Bowker, advised British Foreign Secretary Harold Macmillan that the United Kingdom should "court a sharp rebuff by admonishing Turkey", only a note of distinctly mild disapproval was dispatched to Menderes. The context of the Cold War led Britain and the U.S. to refrain from assigning direct political blame to the Menderes government. The efforts of Greece to internationalize the cause of the Greeks in Turkey through international organizations such as the UN and NATO found little sympathy. British NATO representative Cheetham deemed it "undesirable" to probe the pogrom. U.S. representative Edwin M. Martin thought the effect on the alliance was exaggerated, and the French, Belgians and Norwegians urged the Greeks to "let bygones be bygones".