No. 780
Editorial Note
Following discussions in Rome on November 22 and 27, 1951, Secretary of State Acheson, British Foreign Secretary Eden, and French Foreign Minister Schuman agreed, on behalf of their governments, that the Deputies for Austria of the Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) should meet in London on January 21, 1952 to resume negotiations concerning the Austrian Treaty. As a result of this agreement, Samuel Reber, the United States Deputy for Austria, the chairman-designate of the next Deputy meeting, issued an invitation on December 28, 1951, through the Secretariat of the CFM, to the three Western powers and the Soviet Union, to attend a meeting in London on January 21. For documentation concerning the meetings in Rome and the conversations that followed relating to agreed negotiating tactics vis-à-vis the Soviets, see Foreign Relations, 1951, volume IV, Part 2, pages 1176 ff.
The Governments of the United States, the United Kingdom, and France immediately accepted the invitation and, in addition, agreed to schedule a preliminary meeting of the three Western [Page 1718] Deputies in London on January 18. Documentation concerning this preliminary meeting is in file 663.001.
On January 18 the Soviet Chargé in the United Kingdom sent a letter to the Secretary General of the CFM in which the Soviet Government insisted that the Trieste question and the subject of demilitarization and denazification of Austria be placed on the agenda of the meeting. In a letter of January 19, the Secretary General replied that the issue of demilitarization and denazification should be discussed in the Allied Council for Austria, not in the Deputies meetings, and that the issue of Trieste had no relation to the Austrian Treaty. Two days later the Soviet Chargé informed the Secretary General that the communication of January 19 required further study and that the Soviet representative would not attend the meeting of the Deputies scheduled for January 21. For text of these three messages, see Department of State Bulletin, March 3, 1952, pages 326–327.
The three Western Deputies sent a note to the Soviet Embassy in London on January 24, 1952, in which they pointed out that the persistence of the Soviet Government “in its present attitude would inevitably lead to the conclusion that the Soviet government is deliberately seeking to obstruct the completion of the Austrian treaty”. It also stated that the three Deputies still hoped that the Soviet representative would be able to attend a meeting at an early date and that the chairman remained ready to call a meeting of the Deputies as soon as it could be mutually agreed. For text of this note, see ibid., February 4, 1952, page 160.
Documentation concerning the drafting of the above-mentioned notes to the Soviet Government, as well as negotiations concerning tripartite agreement on tactics to be used by the Western powers when dealing with the Soviets, is in file 663.001.