740.5/12–2954
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Director of the Office of German Affairs (Lyon)
Subject:
- Plans for US–UK action in the event of failure by French to approve Paris pacts.
Participants:
- Sir Roger Makins, British Ambassador
- The Secretary of State
- Mr. Livingston T. Merchant—EUR
- Mr. F. J. Leishman, First Secretary, British Embassy
- Mr. Cecil B. Lyon—GER
Sir Roger opened the conversation by indicating that he had received a report from the British Embassy at Paris that a M. Brusse, a political prognosticator (“sort of a French Mr. Gallup”, Sir Roger thought), had said that the vote in the French Assembly today on the Paris Agreements would be favorable by a margin of between 15 and 25.
The Secretary said that in spite of this it was necessary for us, however, to be prepared for an adverse vote. Were this to occur, the President planned to return immediately to Washington. He had asked the Secretary and other Government officials concerned to be prepared to confer with him on Friday.
The Secretary said that the President had also approved in the first instance the plans for the Secretary’s going to London to confer with [Page 1532] Dr. Adenauer and Sir Anthony Eden. The Secretary then explained Adenauer’s proposal for a tripartite meeting in London on Monday (as set forth in Bonn’s 1878 [1870], December 29 to Department1). The Secretary continued that he thought such a meeting should be followed by a larger meeting but that it would be wiser not to schedule this meeting until we knew more exactly what course we should take. The Secretary also questioned whether having the meeting in London on Monday was not rushing it a bit. He said that he didn’t think it would be possible to delay as long as had been the case following the French defeat of EDC when Sir Anthony traveled about Europe discussing ways and means of saving the situation, and the first formal meetings between the Secretary and Sir Anthony were only held several weeks after the action of the French Assembly.
The Secretary remarked that a good deal of thinking had already been given to the matter of what we should do, and he referred to the Churchill–Eisenhower memorandum of June 27, 19542 and the proposals of the London Working Group of July 5–12, 1954.3
The Secretary also said that he had been giving some thought as to whether a possible solution might not be to alter the Protocol amending the Brussels Pact so that the Pact could be put into effect upon the deposit of ratifications by six instead of seven countries.
The Secretary likewise said that he had asked the Legal Adviser to give him a legal opinion as to whether the fact that France was in Germany due to the US and UK having invited her in, so to speak, might not constitute a legal basis for the US and the UK restoring sovereignty to Germany without French consent. In other words, we were guardians of German sovereignty as a result of our conquest (unconditional surrender) and occupation of Germany. We, so to speak, gave a share of this to France. Could we not give back to Germany the whole which had originally been ours, irrespective of French views? (The Legal Adviser has now indicated that there is no sound legal basis for this proposition. The British have been so informed.)
The British Ambassador suggested that if France did not ratify the agreements it might be better to tackle the problem de novo without France.
It was also suggested that it might be better to defer any decisions as to what the next steps were to be until the tripartite meeting in London in order that Adenauer’s views might be ascertained in the light of the existing situation.
The Secretary indicated that the London meeting would undoubtedly indicate what the next move should be, whether it should be a conference [Page 1533] with the Benelux countries, a NATO meeting or which course of action, and he reiterated his feeling that it would be unwise to meet with these countries until we have a course fairly well charted.
Mr. Merchant stressed the importance of avoiding giving the NATO nations the feeling that they were being left out of the planning—i.e. that the US and UK were deciding what to do and then would present them with a fait accompli.
Sir Roger then raised the question of a possible statement by the President in the event of French approval. He indicated that the Foreign Office wondered whether it was not rather “overdoing it” to have the Chief of State make a declaration since probably the agreements, if approved by the French Assembly, will only just pass by a slight margin. His Government also felt that there were more hurdles to come. In fact there were reports from Paris that the Council of State would probably insist on many changes in the treaties and the whole matter would have to be taken up again in the Assembly in February. Sir Roger said that his Government had instructed him to point this out to the Secretary.
The Secretary replied by indicating that both the President and the British had made statements at the time of the unfavorable vote in the French Assembly a few days ago, that the President was under great pressure from the Press at Augusta and that the President wanted to make a statement. The Secretary then said that the fact that the President was in Augusta made it difficult for the Secretary to talk things over with him as easily as if he were here and consequently he thought it inadvisable to attempt to alter the plan for the President to make this statement.
Sir Roger indicated that his Government was quite prepared to accept this. The Secretary explained that the two statements, one unilateral by the President, and a joint Anglo-American statement, were not mutually exclusive. After the Secretary had communicated with Mr. Hagerty by telephone, the text of a joint statement was agreed upon.
It was decided that copies of this text would be transmitted to the British and the US High Commissioners in Bonn, who would be instructed to show it to Adenauer and to explain to him that it was impossible to make no statement, as Adenauer had suggested.4
It was also agreed that as far as the United States was concerned, the President would issue his statement in Augusta before coming north, and upon his arrival at the airport in Washington he would issue the US portion of the joint statement.
A new fourth paragraph for the President’s statement was drafted.
Copies of both statements are attached.
[Page 1534]- Supra.↩
- This is a reference to the U.S.–U.K. secret minute agreed to by Churchill and Eisenhower; for the text of this secret minute, see p. 988.↩
- For the Report of the London Study Group, July 12, see p. 997.↩
- The text of the joint statement was sent to Bonn in telegram 1767, Dec. 29, repeated to London and Paris for information (396.1/12–2954).↩