Department of State Atomic Energy Files
The Acting Secretary of State to the United States Representative on the Atomic Energy Commission (Baruch)
Dear Mr. Baruch: In my memorandum to you of June 268 I replied to that portion of your letter of June 238 which concerned the dissemination of your opening statement before the Atomic Energy Commission and the reaction to it abroad. You may be sure that we are doing and shall continue to do everything we can to give your statement the widest circulation throughout the world.
I have delayed answering the other points in your letter until I could talk to the President about them. While I was awaiting that opportunity, a telegram on this subject arrived from Ambassador Smith in Moscow. I am attaching to this letter a copy of the telegram.
When I saw the President, we discussed your letter and Ambassador Smith’s telegram.9 The President’s desire, and he expressed it very [Page 859] clearly, is that the efforts of the Atomic Energy Commission not be diverted by the Soviet or by anyone from the task of devising practical and specific measures for the international control of atomic energy. He feels that for us to raise the question of general disarmament would be to distract attention from the task at hand and to confuse the public mind about the nature of our proposals.
As he told you in his letter,10 the President believes that you are off to a fine start. He does not share Ambassador Smith’s opinion that the Soviet has seized the initiative and feels, on the contrary, that through your efforts the United States has the initiative and shall keep it. The best way to maintain the initiative, the best way to achieve some tangible progress in the negotiations, and the best way to discover whether the others genuinely desire to get on with the work, he thinks, is to confine the discussions as closely as possible to the stubborn and real difficulties connected with the control of atomic energy.
I explained to the President your general plan of procedure for the immediate future, as I have understood it from my conversations with you and Mr. Eberstadt and Mr. Evatt.11 I told him that you did not contemplate further general discussions and that you and your staff were working with Mr. Fahy12 on an outline of the specific topics or subjects raised by your proposal. I explained your hope that as these topics are thrashed out in the Commission it will become possible to start drafting on specific points. The President considers this a very intelligent plan and feels that it promises the greatest chance for success.
I am sure that you will find Mr. Fahy and his associates very helpful. Whenever you feel that the Department can be of assistance in any way, I hope that you will let me know.
Sincerely yours,
- Not printed.↩
- Not printed.↩
- The discussion occurred on June 27.↩
- President Truman had written Baruch on June 27 expressing support. That communication is quoted in Joseph I. Lieberman, The Scorpion and the Tarantula: The Struggle to Control Atomic Weapons 1945–1949 (Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1970), p. 316. In his memoirs, Baruch quotes a letter he addressed to President Truman on July 2 summarizing the differences between the United States and Soviet positions and recommending that the United States should remain firm on its position (Bernard M. Baruch, The Public Years, New York, Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1960, p. 373). In a letter to Baruch dated July 10, the President agreed that “we should stand pat on our program.” (Baruch, p. 374; Lieberman, p. 327)↩
- Herbert V. Evatt, Australian Minister of External Affairs; Representative on the Security Council and Atomic Energy Commission (Chairman at 2nd, 3rd, and 4th Meetings).↩
- Mr. Fahy, the Department’s Legal Adviser, had been instructed to have a draft treaty for the control of atomic energy prepared in his office. Henry G. Ingraham, Special Assistant to Mr. Fahy, had been detailed to Mr. Baruch’s office. (Department of State Atomic Energy Files)↩