Foreign Relations of the United States, 1946, Council of Foreign Ministers, Volume II

C.F.M. Files: Lot M–88: Box 2063: US Delegation Minutes

United States Delegation Record, Council of Foreign Ministers, Second Session, Thirty-Seventh Meeting, Palais du Luxembourg, Paris, July 8, 1946, 11:30 a.m.⁶⁵

Paris, July 8, 1946, 11:30 a.m.

secret

Invitations to the Peace Conference and Rules of Procedure

Mr. Byrnes opened the meeting. He stated that, as there was no report from the Deputies or from any Committee, the first question before the Council was its agenda for the meeting. The Chairman suggested that the Council adopt the same agenda as was agreed for Saturday’s meeting and thus avoid lengthy discussion. There were three items on that agenda: (1) Draft invitations to the Peace Conference and rules of procedure; (2) Draft text on Italian reparation; and (3) German questions.

It was agreed to adopt this agenda for the present meeting.

Mr. Byrnes said that the first matter before the Council was that of the draft invitation to the Peace Conference.⁶⁶ He wished to inquire whether his colleagues could agree to send the invitation and then proceed to discuss suggested rules of procedure for the Conference. They had started the day in a good spirit and agreed to the agenda in less than five minutes, which was a record. Was there any objection to the proposal concerning the sending of the invitations?

M. Molotov thought that the Council ought to go ahead with its discussion of the questions involved in the organization of the Conference and its rules of procedure.

Mr. Byrnes said that he felt constrained to point out that the U.S. Delegation believed that the question of the draft invitation should be disposed of first. He suggested that in the invitation the following statement might be included: “The Conference will adopt its own rules of procedure; proposals for the consideration of the Conference will be communicated as soon as possible.” If the invitations could be sent the U.S. Delegation was entirely willing to enter into a discussion of the rules of procedure which might be suggested to the invited governments. The U.S. Delegation was already on record to the effect that it would not approve any procedure proposed by the Four Powers here as binding on the Conference or as binding on the four governments, which would be free to consider and to accept any other proposals on the subject which might be made by members of the Conference.

Mr. Bevin said that he took it that Mr. Byrnes’ last remarks applied only to the question of procedure.

Mr. Byrnes said that his statement meant that the conference could adopt its own procedure. If at the Conference some government made a proposal concerning procedure which impressed the U.S. Delegation as being reasonable and fair, the U.S. Delegation reserved the right to vote for such a proposal. The U.S. Delegation thought that the suggestions⁶⁷ made by the French Delegation could be made the basis of rules of procedure which might be placed before the Conference as suggestions. The French proposals had not come to his personal attention until a few days ago. These proposals had been drafted on April 2 without consultation with the representatives of the other three governments. He (Mr. Byrnes) was satisfied that this had been done as an act of courtesy on the part of the French Government and with the full realization that the Conference would adopt its own procedure. These French suggestions might be made the basis of tentative proposals which the Four Powers might wish to place before the other governments for their consideration. They could be discussed, and if there were objections to some points, the French Delegation probably would agree to modify the proposals, as it had shown at the meeting of July 6. So far as the United States was concerned, it was not interested one way or the other in a proposal for a General Commission. This was a question which could be regulated easily and in an entirely satisfactory way.

The main point was that the invitations should go out immediately and that the Conference should be left free to adopt its own procedure. The U.S. Delegation submitted that, since the Council had announced to the world that the Conference would be held on July 29, it ought to send the invitations and could include at the end of those invitations the words which had just been suggested, namely that the Conference would adopt its own rules of procedure (which the four governments could not prevent even if they wanted to) and that proposals for the consideration of the Conference would be submitted as soon as possible.

M. Molotov stated that it was a surprising fact that they were wasting so much time in discussing obvious things. They were dealing with questions to which the experience of international conferences provided a very definite answer. The Conference which followed the First World War for example followed rules of procedure which had been prepared in advance in order to insure the normal working of the Conference. In the case of the United Nations Organization a special Preparatory Commission had been set up prior to the convocation of the General Assembly last January. This Preparatory Commission drafted rules of procedure for the General Assembly and this facilitated the Assembly’s procedures. In the present case no one had expressed any doubt when the French Delegation had submitted its proposals concerning the organs of the Conference and the rules of procedure in the latter part of March. Now the Council was marking time and was not deciding this question although it was responsible for doing so. Under the circumstances it was clear that it was necessary for the Council to work out the rules of procedure. The Soviet Delegation suggested that they proceed at once to discuss concrete proposals. The Deputies had already discussed the matter and the only remaining issue was whether the Conference was to have one or two Economic Committees. Was it really impossible for them to complete consideration of this question and to decide without any further delay on the organs of the Conference? The Soviet Delegation had no objection to taking as a basis the French Delegation’s proposal subject to the amendments suggested by M. Bidault on Saturday.⁶⁸ Furthermore, on the question of the Commissions, the Soviet Delegation was willing to adopt the plan which had been worked out by the Deputies on Saturday subject to the amendment that there be not one but two Economic Commissions as was the case during the present session of the Council, which had one Economic Committee working on Italian problems and another on Balkan problems. If these amendments could be adopted then all the questions would be disposed of and real progress would be made. It would then remain for the Council to settle the questions of voting in the Commissions of the Conference. On this the Soviet Delegation suggested that they abide by the same rules followed in the United Nations Organization, all important questions being decided by a two-thirds majority. If that rule could be adopted, all outstanding questions would be disposed of.

Mr. Byrnes said that he had to call attention to the fact, in view of M. Molotov’s statement that the Deputies had agreed on all but one question, that in the meeting of the Deputies on Saturday the U.S. Deputy, after consultation with his Secretary of State, had made the following statement:

“I wish to make a statement and explain my position, which I do not suppose is different from the positions of all of us. Any statements which I make this morning on the documents which are before us must not be considered as committing the United States Delegation to the principle of sending out to the governments invited any binding set of rules of procedure for the Conference, which will, of course, adopt its own rules of procedure.”

Mr. Byrnes went on to say that there could be no question about what had happened at San Francisco. No four nations had undertaken, in sending out the invitations, to lay down the rules for the San Francisco Conference. The rules of procedure had been adopted by the Conference itself after it convened and had not been dictated by anybody. With reference to M. Molotov’s remarks regarding the United Nations General Assembly the U.S. Delegation was entirely willing to follow the course which had been followed there. Fifty-one nations had appointed members to the Preparatory Commission to which the Soviet representative had referred. Nobody had ever charged that that Preparatory Commission had undermined the work of the Conference. It had on it representatives of all members of the United Nations. He was willing to follow that procedure again and say in the invitations that the governments were invited to name members of a Preparatory Commission to meet in Paris on July 26 to draw up rules of procedure. His objection to entering into a discussion of the various proposals which had been made here was that he was not willing to change the decision of July 4 to invite those governments to the Peace Conference. He was not willing to make that decision conditional upon the acceptance of any procedure that the four governments might decide to support. The U.S. Delegation took the position, in a perfectly good spirit, that everyone seated at the table and practically everyone in the room knew very well that on the night of July 4 the Council had agreed that the Peace Conference would be held on July 29, and that not one word had been said by anybody about conditions concerning the rules of procedure. He wanted to know now whether they were going to stand by that agreement or whether there would be a refusal to carry it out until some understanding was reached on the rules of procedure. He asked this because, if that agreement was broken and they had to meet a condition, he did not know what the next condition would be or what else they would have to accept before the world could be invited to a Peace Conference.

Mr. Bevin said that he was anxious to see a solution of this problem, but that he really could not tie himself to anything on this question of procedure. In saying that he wished to make it quite clear that in the matter of the treaties all clauses to which he had agreed in the Council he would support at the Conference. He reserved his position, of course, on all those questions which had [not?] been agreed in the Council and which would be presented to the Conference in unagreed form. But procedure was something quite different. Anything which the Four Powers might say or propose concerning the procedure would not in any way take away the prerogative of the Conference to adopt its own procedure nor would it bind the four governments or the Conference to anything. On that understanding he was willing to discuss what procedure might be suggested to the other governments. That discussion, however, should not prejudice the sending out of the invitations.

Mr. Bevin said that all the points raised by M. Molotov were controversial. If the sending of the invitations should be held up until there was agreement on these proposals concerning commissions and voting he was afraid that they would be in a deadlock. If it were merely a matter of sending proposals forward as suggestions to be considered by the Conference, he had no objection to discussing those questions and he had no objection to the particular amendments put forward by M. Bidault on Saturday. On the subject of voting he had a suggestion to make, as a preliminary remark, that it might be advisable not to have any voting in the Commissions. If agreement could not be reached in them, the various points might be reported to the Conference and it would be up to the Conference to determine the issues. That was what had been done under the present procedure of the Council of Foreign Ministers. Points on which the Deputies were unable to agree were brought before the Council. This was not to be an ordinary Peace Conference and was not comparable to the meetings of the United Nations Organization. Its functions were limited to making recommendations. It might be a good idea to have unagreed reports come to the Conference from the Commissions in cases where the Commissions did not reach agreement. The Conference should not be barred from discussing differences where they might exist. He thought that this suggestion might commend itself to his colleagues. For one thing it would prevent proposals being blocked from coming before the Conference and would allow the Conference to express itself on any recommendations or differences of views which might come forward from the Commissions. Actually the Conference would not make decisions but only recommendations to the Council of Foreign Ministers in accordance with the Moscow agreement. That was quite different from the United Nations Organization; it could take decisions. Some such procedure as he had suggested instead of a rigid voting procedure might meet the situation.

M. Molotov said that he thought they should pass on from general discussion to the concrete questions they were called upon to consider. The Soviet Delegation understood that M. Bidault’s proposal was acceptable both to the U.K. and Soviet Delegations. He had not heard any view expressed by the U.S. Delegation in opposition to it. The U.S. Delegation had not said anything. The only amendment which the Soviet Delegation wished to make to M. Bidault’s proposal was to add a provision specifying the Commissions which were to be set up and providing that among those Commissions there be two Economic Commissions as was the case here in the Council of Foreign Ministers. Finally the Soviet Delegation wished to suggest that, on the model of the General Assembly of the United Nations, they adopt a decision that questions of procedure in the Plenary Conference, the General Commission, and the Commissions be decided by majority vote and all other questions, including those concerning the character of the questions considered, by two-thirds majority vote. This would be in keeping with Article 18 of the United Nations Charter. If the Council could reach agreement on these simple questions the whole matter would be disposed of.

Mr. Bevin said that, to be accurate, the procedure in the Commissions of the General Assembly of the United Nations, according to Rule 99 was that decisions would be taken by majority vote. The provision is not for a two-thirds majority but for a simple majority. He said that he was referring to Rule 99 of the provisional rules of procedure for the General Assembly which he was advised were adopted by the General Assembly and were now being applied. This procedure seemed to be all right.

Mr. Byrnes said that he had to ask the Council to come back to its agenda. The first point was that of the draft invitations. The question was would they adhere to and carry out the agreement of July 4 to send the invitations. He had looked at the minutes of that meeting. He would be glad to have the French representative, who had been Chairman on that day, read his minutes of the meeting or to hear those which had been kept by the U.K. or Soviet Delegations, in order to see if anyone could question that the Peace Conference date had been agreed without one single word being said regarding conditions such as were now being proposed. According to the American record of that meeting the Chairman had suggested that the Peace Conference be held on the 29th of July and had asked whether the Council could agree on that date and avoid a long debate on the calendar. Mr. Bevin had had no objection; Mr. Molotov had had no objection; Mr. Bidault had had no objection. That was the record. The question now was should they stand by their agreement. He had stated on Saturday that he had no particular interest in the General Commission, but as the representative of the United States he had simply declined to enter into any discussion of the rules of procedure before it had been settled that they would carry out the agreement of July 4 to the effect that the Peace Conference would be held on July 29 and that the Deputies should draft the invitations to be sent out. If it was true that the agreement of July 4 could not be carried out unless something else was agreed to, it ought to be made clear to the world that that agreement was going to be violated unless certain conditions were fulfilled, and it ought to be made clear by whom it was being violated. The United States was not going to agree to any invitations being sent out to sovereign governments with strings tied to them requiring those governments to agree to any rules of procedure. If the invitations were sent out, the U.S. Delegation would agree with the other Delegations here to join in suggesting rules of procedure. The question now was whether the invitations could be sent out by the French Government that day. If so the Council could proceed to consider rules of procedure. On this question the Chairman would like to hear the views of the four Members of the Council. Beginning at the left he wished to ask the French representative whether he was in favor of the invitations being sent that day in accordance with the agreement made on July 4 when the French representative had been in the Chair.

M. Bidault said yes.

Mr. Bevin said yes.

M. Molotov said that nobody had made any proposal to cancel the decision of the 4th of July. The Soviet Delegation thought it necessary, however, that the Council should examine the question raised by the draft invitations which contained a paragraph saying that proposals for the organs of the Conference and its rules of procedure were being sent simultaneously with the invitations. The Soviet Delegation could on no account agree to the postponement of discussion of the question of the organs and rules of procedure of the Conference, particularly since it had developed that to do so was likely to lead to the violation of the decisions of the Moscow Conference which provided for the convocation of the Peace Conference and since the likelihood had arisen that the Conference would be turned into a rubber stamp. The Soviet Delegation could not agree to postpone this question. While there was no necessity of adopting the whole procedure in detail, they ought to adopt the basic rules of procedure as was suggested by the French Delegation on Saturday.

Mr. Byrnes said that he did not think anyone would question the fact that when they agreed on July 4 to send the invitations not one word was said about rules of procedure. Since that time the question of rules of procedure had been brought up in the meeting of the Deputies. When it had been discussed there the U.S. Deputy had made plain the position of the United States. The position now was that the U.S. Delegation was not holding up discussion of the rules of procedure. When the invitations had been sent, he was quite ready to discuss them, but he could not agree to hold up the invitations until agreement was reached on one Delegation’s idea concerning the rules of procedure. The question was whether they stood by their agreement of July 4. When that question was disposed of, the next question for discussion would be the rules of procedure.

Mr. Bevin said that it was his understanding that the paragraph in dispute, the last paragraph of the draft invitation, was put in by M. Vyshinsky and that the other Deputies had reserved their positions. When the draft invitation had first been placed before the Council, he (Mr. Bevin) had called attention to the fact that it went beyond the agreement.

Mr. Byrnes said that the record showed, when the U.S. Deputy had given the report of the Deputies to the Council on July 5, he had said: “Whereas the U.K. and U.S. Deputies hope that it may be possible to agree to some procedure, they do not agree that it is necessary to withhold the invitation until agreement is reached upon these proposals as they consider it important that the invitation be issued today”. The Council should know that no Deputy had any right to change an agreement of the Council of Foreign Ministers reached at the Council table. An agreement had been reached here on July 4 and the Deputies had been instructed to draft the invitations. Nothing had been said about rules of procedure. The U.S. Deputy had properly reserved the position of his Delegation on that point at the meeting of the Deputies. If he had not done so, he (Mr. Byrnes) would have had to point out at the Council table that conditions could not be added to decisions taken by the Foreign Ministers. The invitations should follow automatically from the decision taken on July 4 to hold the Conference on July 29. It was independent of the question of procedure. If conditions were made, that was a violation of the agreement which the Council had reached.

M. Molotov said that no one raised objection to the date of July 29. That was a question which had been decided. The Council had instructed the Deputies to draft the text of the invitation. They had worked on it and had submitted a draft. The idea had not entered the head of any of the Deputies that it was not necessary to talk about the organs and procedure of the Conference. For some reason he thought the U.S. Delegation was making an attempt to turn this question into a subject of interminable debate. The French Delegation had submitted a proposal. The U.K. Delegation had accepted it as a basis, as had the Soviet Delegation subject to one amendment. The U.S. Delegation, however, was using this question in an attempt to dictate its will to others. The Soviet Delegation could not accept that especially after it had become clear that there was an attempt to turn the Conference into a rubber stamp. The Soviet Delegation could not agree with that and therefore suggested that the Council come to an agreement on the organs and rules of procedure for the Peace Conference in accordance with the Moscow decisions.

Mr. Byrnes said that he wished only to say that M. Molotov had made a remarkable statement in view of the fact that the three other Members of the Council had just said that morning that they were willing to have the invitations sent that day and then go on to discuss the question of procedure.

M. Molotov said that a document had been circulated, C.F.M.(46) 190. No one had raised any objection to its circulation. It referred to the fact that proposals on the organs of the Conference and on rules of procedure were being forwarded simultaneously. No one had made any reservations regarding circulation of that document, therefore he suggested that they discuss it. It said specifically that proposals were being forwarded simultaneously with the invitations. Concrete proposals were now before the Council which were acceptable to the majority of Delegations.

Mr. Bevin said that he was sure that M. Molotov would not willingly misquote him. He had made it clear from the very first that he was in favor of sending out the invitations forthwith and letting the Deputies discuss procedure. He had said quite clearly that morning that his government would not be bound by anything said in the discussion here on procedure and would retain the right to take any position on it at the Conference. What he would say was that if a document was going forward with a suggested basis for the procedure of the Conference, he personally had no objection to M. Bidault’s proposals, but he did not agree that it could go forward as an agreed procedure which he would be committed to support at the Conference. He had made other suggestions in a friendly way. He had called attention to Rule 99 of the Procedure of the United Nations General Assembly. As he saw it, what was endangering the proceedings of the Council was that these matters were being made a condition of the carrying out of the agreement made on July 4. If they should be removed as a condition he was quite sure that the matter could be cleared up in a few minutes.

Mr. Bevin said that he had finished stating his position and would not say anything more about it.

M. Bidault thought that everything had already been said more than once.

Mr. Byrnes pointed out that the French and British Delegations had said definitely that they were willing that the invitations go out immediately without waiting for an agreement on rules of procedure. The question was whether the Soviet Delegation could also agree to that. If so they could proceed to a discussion of the rules of procedure and see if they could reach agreement on the form in which the matter might be submitted to the invited governments.

M. Molotov suggested that they abide by the draft which had been circulated and which provided that the proposals concerning the organs and procedures of the Conference would be sent out simultaneously with the invitations.

Mr. Byrnes said that when that document had been placed before the Council the Chairman of the Deputies had made the statement that whereas the U.K. and U.S. Deputies hoped that it might be possible to agree to some procedure, they did not agree that it was necessary to withhold the invitations until agreement was reached upon such proposals as they considered it important that the invitations be issued that day. When the subject had been broached at the Council table the U.S. Delegation had said immediately that it would not agree to the last paragraph of the draft invitation but would agree only to the position which it stated then and was stating again now. The U.S. position was that if any proposals were submitted to those governments they would have to be submitted as suggestions only and it would have to be clearly indicated that the Four Powers were not attempting to influence or put pressure on sovereign governments to accept some procedure against their will. He had made it clear that he would have no respect for the representative of any sovereign government who would accept an invitation to come to a Conference which was accompanied by rules of procedure unless it was made quite clear that such rules were only suggestions and that the Conference would have full power to adopt its own procedure.

M. Molotov said that the Soviet Delegation could on no account agree to that point of view. Among other things it ran counter to decisions which had already been adopted on Trieste and other questions and other decisions adopted at Berlin and Moscow in connection with the calling of the Conference. The viewpoint expressed by Mr. Byrnes was in contradiction of all the work the Council had been doing.

Mr. Byrnes said that there had certainly been a misunderstanding. He could not let M. Molotov’s statement pass without stating that the United States stood by its agreements. When the Peace Conference met the United States would support the agreement on Trieste and every other agreement which had been made in the Council. It would uphold the agreement on reparation which had been made on July 4. It also wished to uphold the other agreement which had been made on July 4, the agreement to send invitations to the Peace Conference. The fact that the U.S. wished to let the twenty-one governments adopt their own rules of procedure was no reason for doubting that the U.S. would support every decision which had been made at the Council table. He was asking only that others do the same thing.

Mr. Byrnes asked if there was any use in continuing the meeting or whether it might be advisable to adjourn.

M. Bidault believed that it would be preferable to adjourn.

It was decided that the next meeting should be at 5 o’clock the same day. The meeting adjourned at 1:45 p.m.

65. For a list of persons present at this meeting, see the Record of Decisions, infra.
66. For text of the invitation to the Peace Conference as subsequently approved by the Council of Foreign Ministers, see C.F.M.(46) 190 (Revised), July 8, 1946, p. 834.
67. The reference here presumably is to C.F.M.(D) (46) 52 and C.F.M.(D) (46) 53, both April 2, 1946, pp. 38 and 43.
68. July 6.