Eisenhower Library, Eisenhower papers, Whitman file
Memorandum of Discussion at the 186th Meeting of the National Security Council, Friday, February 26, 19541
[Extracts]
eyes only
Present at this meeting were the President of the United States, presiding; the Vice President of the United States; the Secretary of State; the Acting Secretary of Defense; the Acting Director, Foreign Operations Administration; and the Director, Office of Defense Mobilization. Also present were the Secretary of the Treasury; the Director, Bureau of the Budget; the Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission; the Under Secretary of State; the U.S. Representative to the United Nations; the Secretary of the Army; Mr. Smith for the Secretary of the Navy; the Secretary of the Air Force; the Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff; the Chief of Staff, U.S. Army; the Chief of Staff, U.S. Air Force; Robert R. Bowie, Department of State; the Director of Central Intelligence; the Assistant to the President; Mr. Cutler and Mr. Jackson, Special Assistants to the President; the Deputy Assistant to the President; Bryce Harlow, Administrative Assistant to the President; the Executive Secretary, NSC; and the Deputy Executive Secretary, NSC.
Following is a summary of the report and discussion at the meeting and the main points taken.
1. Meeting of the Four Foreign Ministers2
. . . . . . .
IV. Atomic Energy Matters
Secretary Dulles said that he had had two full talks plus a dinner talk with Molotov on the subject of the President’s speech to the United Nations on the peaceful uses of atomic energy.3 The next step will be the submission, through normal diplomatic channels, of a fairly elaborate statement of our plan to follow through on the President’s proposal. Molotov had pointed out that if we were to have any conference on this subject, it would have to include Communist China. So, said Secretary Dulles, we can anticipate all the usual procedural hurdles before we ever get into a real negotiation with the Soviets on this subject. At every step the USSR invariably drags in Communist China, in order to convince [Page 1365] the world that it is only our stubborness on this issue which blocks the solution of all the great problems that afflict the world.
The French, and especially the British, are very anxious to get into these talks on atomic energy more fully. We hope to have our own plan completed soon, a statement which Admiral Strauss confirmed. Secretary Dulles said that he had already agreed that the British and the Canadians should be brought into the talks when they had reached a certain level, since they were actually engaged in the production of atomic weapons. The French, the Belgians, and the South Africans, as suppliers of raw materials, would have to be brought in at a different level. But in any event, said Secretary Dulles, we must move ahead on this front very rapidly if we are to avoid embarrassment.
Ambassador Lodge confirmed Secretary Dulles’ position by noting that he was under constant pressure to get this matter before the UN Disarmament Commission.
Secretary Dulles explained that the disarmament plan to which Ambassador Lodge was referring was quite a different issue from the President’s proposal with regard to the peaceful uses of atomic energy. He had made this distinction very clear in his discussions at Berlin, though the British had pointed out that if the two problems could be combined and submitted to the UN Disarmament Commission, the issue of Communist Chinese participation could be avoided. Secretary Dulles, however, doubted whether the Russians could ever be induced to agree to this procedure.
The President expressed some doubt as to whether the problem was as urgent as Secretary Dulles seemed to think. Secretary Dulles replied that he believed world opinion was very anxious to hear the follow-up on the President’s proposal, and he very much hoped that our own U.S. position would be clear in no more than three weeks.
The President, pointing out that the problem was a vast one to deal with at one blow, inquired whether it could not go forward in a series of phases. Secretary Dulles said that this might be possible, but that the matter had already progressed so far that it was more desirable to rely on the present plan and to complete this plan as a matter of urgency.
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- Prepared by Deputy Executive Secretary Gleason on Feb. 26.↩
- For the full record of Secretary Dulles’ report on the Berlin Conference presented at this meeting, see volume vii.↩
- For accounts of the two full meetings, see telegrams Dulte 23, Jan. 31, and Dulte 71, Feb. 14, from Berlin, ibid.↩