Foreign Relations of the United States, 1951, European Security and the German Question, Volume III, Part 1

740.5/12–751

The Secretary of State to the British Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs (Eden)¹

secret

[ December 8, 1951.]

My Dear Mr. Eden: Since your departure from Rome, I have been thinking of the conversation we had on the Eur def force when you and I lunched last Thurs.² You will recall that you asked my view as to whether your country cld make a useful contribution at this point to assist in a solution to what we both agreed was a very confused sitn. My offhand reaction was that any new initiative at this particular moment might serve to complicate negotiations.

While I retain this view as to any immediate action on your part, I have been wondering whether the time may not shortly arrive when some positive move by the UK cld provide the catalyst that seems so necessary to move this effort along to fruition on the continent. I am thinking here primarily in terms of the polit and Parliamentary aspects of the prob rather than the mechanics of securing and agreed draft treaty by experts.

I know you share my concern over the French sitn. We are skating on thin ice on the question as to whether the French Parl will in the end support its govt’s initiative for the creation of a common force in Eur. This concern has, I believe, diverted our attention somewhat from Adenauer’s position with the Bundestag, where again the outcome cannot be forecast with any comfortable degree of certainty. You are closer to the Benelux sitn than I, but here also there will undoubtedly be severe strains prior to the governmental and Parliamentary approval of the concept of a single Eur force involving any degree of common polit and financial control.

While the above may sound pessimistic, I still believe the task can be accomplished if we all do everything we can to insure a realistic draft treaty at an early date and if we address ourselves to aiding the various govts with their Parliamentary problems.

I know you have these problems very much in mind, but I shld take great comfort if you wld continue to weigh your position, particularly as regards the latter problems above. If, for instance, we come to foresee Parliamentary disapproval in France, or even Ger, or a possible withdrawal by the Benelux nations, it is quite possible that the position of your govt might be the factor which cld make success out of failure. The consequences of failure wld indeed be tragic, as there seems, at least to me, no satisfactory alternative approach at this late date to the problems of securing the assistance of Ger in the def effort.

I do not suggest that you make any move at this time. Furthermore, I do not believe that it is possible to make a helpful move until matters have progressed a little farther in Paris and it is clearer than it is at present and we find what the sticking points are. Perhaps the most useful area to explore is what form of association by the UK with the Eur Army wld be possible for you.³

I have communicated with Gen Eisenhower on the substance of this message and find him in gen agrmt with the views expressed herein.

I was greatly encouraged by our association in the recent mtgs and the frankness and clarity of your views. I look forward to our mtgs next month with a certainty that we shall move even farther forward to a similarity of view on many of the issues that confront us both.⁴

Sincerely,

Dean Acheson

1. The source text was sent in telegram 891, December 7, from Paris to the Embassy in London, eyes only for Ambassador Gilford, with instructions that it be delivered to Foreign Secretary Eden, and repeated for information as telegram 3398, from Paris to the Department of State, eyes only for Acting Secretary of State Webb and Deputy Under Secretary Matthews. This message appears to have been delivered in London on December 8.

   With the exception of paragraph 6, this message is identical with the draft proposed by Byroade in telegram 272, December 3, from Paris to Rome, p. 948. The text of paragraph 6 in Byroade’s draft is indicated in footnote 3, below. The copy of this message signed by the Secretary of State and indicating his personal corrections to a revised version of paragraph 6 (see footnote 3, below) was apparently delivered to the Embassy in Paris by the pilot who had flown Byroade to Gibraltar to join the Secretary of State and his party aboard the SS Independence. (Paris Embassy files, 400 EDF)

2. The reference here is presumably to the private luncheon between Secretary Acheson and Foreign Secretary Eden reported upon in the Secretary’s memorandum of conversation of November 29, p. 746.

3. In Byroade’s original draft of this message (see telegram 272, December 3, from Paris to Rome, p. 948), this paragraph read as follows:

   “I have no definite suggestion at this point as to what you might do in the above eventuality, nor the complications for you in announcing your willingness to some type of institutional association with the defense community, some association of your troops in Europe with the Force, or perhaps some formal declaration of a warmer UK support for the concept of the European Defense Community. I shall continue to think of this problem and send you such thoughts as I may have. I think you can see that what I am groping for is a possible boost of a psychological nature rather than legalisms.”

   In the copy of this message carried from Gibraltar to Paris and amended by the Secretary (see footnote 1, above), paragraph 6 initially read as follows:

   “I do not suggest that you make any statement at this time. Indeed it still seems to me, as it did when you and I talked, that even the slightest suspicion that you might be about to make some suggestion would end any chance of the six nations working out some solution for themselves. Furthermore, I do not believe that it is possible to make a helpful suggestion until matters have progressed a little farther in Paris and it is clearer than it is to me at this moment what the sticking points are. Perhaps the most useful area to explore is what form of association by the UK with the European Army would be possible for you.”

   The Secretary of State himself initialed the excisions and correction resulting in the version of the paragraph as printed here.

4. In a reply of December 19 (transmitted to the Department of State by the British Embassy on December 20), not printed, Eden stated that he had given the Secretary’s message much thought and had had it with him during his visit with Prime Minister Churchill to Paris on December 17 and 18. Regarding that visit and Eden’s evaluation thereof, see telegram 2813, December 19, from London, and footnote 3, thereto, p. 971.