Lot 54D423
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Consultant to the Secretary (Dulles)
Subject: Australian-New Zealand Security
| Participants: | Ambassador Percy Spender, Embassy of Australia |
| Ambassador Sir Carl Berendsen, Embassy of New Zealand | |
| Mr. David McNicol, Embassy of Australia | |
| Mr. G. R. Laking, Embassy of New Zealand | |
| Mr. John Foster Dulles | |
| Colonel C. Stanton Babcock | |
| Mr. Livingston Satterthwaite |
At a meeting today with Ambassador Spender of Australia and Ambassador Berendsen of New Zealand it was tentatively agreed that:
1. Article VII of the proposed tripartite security treaty should be amended by eliminating all reference to “subsidiary bodies” and to read as follows:
“The parties hereby establish a Council on which each of them shall be represented to consider matters concerning the implementation of this Treaty. The Council should be so organized as to be able to meet promptly at any time.”
In the course of discussion it was recognized that the Council would be the master of its own procedure and could of course do whatever it found to be necessary to accomplish its purposes. It was agreed, however, that the likelihood of the need of “subsidiary bodies” was not such that it should be specifically mentioned in the treaty and that the purpose should be to have an essential political body, simple in structure and with compact, high-level personnel.
2. Article VIII should be redrafted as follows:
“Pending the development of a more comprehensive system of regional security in the Pacific area and the development by the United Nations of effective means to maintain international peace and security, the Council, established by Article VII, is authorized to maintain a consultative relationship with States, Regional Organizations, Associations of States, or other authorities in a position to further the purposes of this Treaty and to contribute to the security of the Pacific Area.”
It is agreeable both to the Australian and New Zealand Governments to omit the words preceding “the Council”. However, these words are acceptable to them in view of the opinion expressed by [Page 220] the Far Eastern Subcommittee of the Foreign Relations Committee that the operative portion of the treaty should itself contain reference to further developments, particularly under the auspices of the United Nations.
The new language eliminates all of the last sentence, the earlier Article VIII with its reference to “planning” which was objected to by the JCS.
In so far as relates to consultation (not “planning”) with other states, regional organizations, etc., it merely authorizes consultation as a possibility, whereas the original language of Article VIII seemed to make this mandatory (“shall maintain” and “shall coordinate”). It was pointed out that the Council under this treaty would have no power itself to establish a “consultative relationship” with anyone; that consultation was a two-way proposition and that it could not occur unless all parties concerned wanted it. The United States, for example, as a member of NATO or of the RIO Pact, was not prepared to commit itself to consultation by these associations with the tripartite Pacific Council.
It is believed that the present text fully meets the preoccupations of the JCS and that consideration should now be given to a prompt initialling of a text as a further step which can be announced and which is particularly desired in view of the growing anxiety regarding Iran where Australia and New Zealand have commitments which make it important quickly to reassure their people that there is no hitch in the program to assure that the United States will stand with them in the Pacific.1
- Colonel Babcock’s memorandum of his conversation held June 30 with Mr. F. H. Corner, First Secretary of the Embassy of New Zealand, indicated in part that the Department was informed that day that the Governments of both Australia and New Zealand had accepted the versions of Articles VII and VIII tentatively agreed upon at the meeting described above. (790.5/6–3051)↩