During the same period that "Near East" moved towards obsolescence among the British, it became the preferred term of the U.S. Department of State. In 1944, the State Department had an Office of Near Eastern and African Affairs, subdivided into three divisions: Near Eastern, Middle Eastern, and African. The region covered by the Division of Middle Eastern Affairs corresponded to the earliest British usage of "Middle East." The core of the region usually referred to today as the Middle East (Turkey, the Levant, Arabia, Egypt) was covered by the Division of Near Eastern Affairs.

Source: U.S. Government Manual, Summer 1944, 191.