Foreign Relations of the United States, 1946, General; the United Nations, Volume I

501.BB/10–2946: Telegram

Senator Austin to the Secretary of State

top secret
urgent

New York, October 29, 1946—11 p.m.
[Received 11:15 p.m.]

726. Personal for the Secretary. Following is the text suggested by Senator Vandenberg²¹ and Mr. Dulles²² which I read to you over the telephone.²³ An alternative text will follow by separate telegram.

“I refer in beginning to the brilliant speech yesterday of our distinguished colleague from the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.²⁴ In the candor which is permissible between friends, I express my deep regret that he found it necessary to deal in implications and invectives aimed at the good faith of the Foreign Policy of the Government of the United States. This has been a far too consistent pattern throughout the discussions in recent months in Paris. It is not conducive to the peace climate for which we join him in pleading. I hope we may all find it advisable to avoid recriminations here. I repeat what was said by an American representative in the final Plenary Session of the recent Paris Conference who found it necessary to say: ‘The United States will leave its motives to the verdict of history; it will not plead as a defendant among allies to whom it has given every ounce of cooperation, in blood and sweat and tears, of which a great and unselfish nation is capable.!’²⁵ That closes the chapter so far as we are concerned.

But now I am happy to open a new and brighter chapter. I Want to say to Mr. Molotov that the United States warmly welcomes his proposal for an immediate study of universal disarmament—much the same proposal which Mr. Litvinoff offered to the League of Nations many years ago which included adequate international inspection. What he has said is of grave importance because he says it. Just as our American testimony is of paramount value in respect to the control of atomic energy because we are at the moment in possession of an atomic monopoly, so Soviet testimony is of paramount value in respect to other disarmament because they now maintain by far the greatest armies in all the world and keep them in occupation of many critical points in central Europe. We mean what we say when we tell the world that we would outlaw atomic bombs forever, anywhere, any time, any place on earth, and when, in return, we ask only for effective guarantees against bad faith. We accept Mr. Molotov’s eloquent and sturdy interest in world disarmament as being in the same pattern of complete earnestness and purpose. We assume that he, too, would wish assurance that disarmament shall be totally protected by international inspection in all aspects against bad faith.

I can assure the distinguished Soviet statesman that the Government of the United States—long since a world pioneer in cooperative disarmament—will join with him enthusiastically in the exploration of such a proposal to take the tools of war from the arsenals of men.”

Austin

21. Arthur H. Vandenberg, United States Senator from Michigan; Representative to the General Assembly.
22. John Foster Dulles, Alternate United States Representative to the General Assembly.

23. This text was suggested for incorporation into Senator Austin’s address in the general discussion phase of the work of the General Assembly; it was anticipated that Senator Austin would be called upon to present the views of the United States on October 30.

    The source text bears the following marginal notation by Mr. Hiss: “The Secretary talked by telephone directly to Senator Austin.”

24. See the bracketed note, supra.
25. The reference is to Senator Vandenberg’s address at the 46th Plenary Meeting of the Paris Peace Conference, October 14; for text, see Department of State Bulletin, October 27, 1946, pp. 744–746. For additional documentation on United States policy at the Paris Peace Conference, see vols. iii and iv .