Foreign Relations of the United States, 1955–1957, Regulation of Armaments; Atomic Energy, Volume XX

129. Letter From the Officer in Charge, Office of United Nations Political and Security Affairs (Meyers), to the Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs (Wilcox)¹

London, April 5, 1956.

Dear Fran And David:² This is the fourth in my “atmospheric” letters.³

The past week has been distinguished by two events: the first was the introduction of the Soviet proposal; the second was the introduction Tuesday of the US working paper.⁴

I have already forwarded to you a brief memorandum⁵ which I wrote to Mr. Stassen on the meaning of the Soviet proposal. In sum, I believe that the Soviet tactic is their usual one in the disarmament sphere, in which they play propaganda, strategic objectives and possible negotiations simultaneously. Just which of these they wish to concentrate on will not be clear, in my opinion, for some time. I am convinced that the USSR will introduce another proposal, taking account of the nuclear problem which is so carefully omitted in large part from their present paper, and that this will give us a better line on Soviet intent. In this connection, I was most happy to see the two telegrams from the Department which requested correction of the impression that the USSR had gone a long way toward accepting the President’s Geneva proposal and which noted the degree to which the USSR placed the German problem at the center of its proposals.⁶ I think that both these telegrams had a most salutary effect here.

Regarding the introduction of the US working paper, I am attaching a copy of a memorandum from Ed Gullion and myself to the Governor.⁷ Although our memorandum is more detailed than those of the other members of the delegation, it was interesting to note the unanimity of opinion on the part of the delegation advisers. All recommended against the introduction of this paper without at a minimum further “vetting”. The telegram to the Department which described the Five Power meeting emphasizes that this paper was introduced because of Gromyko’s line of questioning.⁸ Before the paper was introduced, the Governor and I had a long conversation on the subject, in which he drew the analogy to the situation in San Francisco in which various working papers were introduced in order to stimulate revisions and eventual agreement.⁹ In addition, he said that he was worried about the French attitude on the subject of force-levels. I, in turn, stressed the difficulty of drawing analogy here to the San Francisco situation, and said that I doubted our allies or the Russians would introduce revisions or suggest changes in the US working paper. Moreover, I believe that a perusal of the verbatim record of this meeting, when it arrives, will show that Gromyko was not pressing the French hard at all on the matter of force-levels.

In my opinion, this working paper was introduced for other reasons, largely of a “public opinion” nature. The Governor has in mind introducing revisions to the paper, and the staff will at least have an opportunity to make comments, which may or may not be incorporated in the revisions. I might add that we had less than an hour within which to read the working paper and submit our views before it was introduced. Only one minor revision was made in the paper on which we commented before it was tabled in the Subcommittee; this was the citation of the force-level figure of 2.5 million as “illustrative”.

Mr. Stassen has in mind introducing next week a “low-level working document” and subsequently substituting a concise US memorandum of approved position and “withdrawing” the working paper before the Subcommittee sessions end. This concise working paper presumably will contain Washington’s comments and specific language approved by you. I believe that the USSR and the US have changed positions not only on substance but also on form, since the US working paper is exceedingly difficult to understand and that has caused considerable confusion both in the Subcommittee and among the press here.

I trust that I do not sound too much like an ancient on the Wailing Wall. I believe, however, that it is incumbent on me to keep you as fully advised as possible of developments of particular note.

Respectfully,

Howard

1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 600.0012/3–556. Confidential. A copy was sent to Bond.
2. Though Meyers’ letter was addressed to Wilcox, the salutation also included presumably David Wainhouse.
3. For Meyers’ third and sixth letters to Wilcox, March 23 and April 16, see supra, and Document 133, respectively.
4. The Soviet proposal introduced on March 27 and the U.S. working paper introduced on April 3 are printed in Documents on Disarmament, 1945–1959, vol. I, pp. 603–613.
5. Not found in Department of State files.
6. One reference is presumably to telegram 5760, March 30. (Department of State, Central Files, 330.13/3–3056) The other telegram has not been identified.
7. Not printed. (Ibid., 660.0012/3–556)
8. Reference is presumably to the subcommittee meeting of April 5, summarized in telegram 4393 from London. (Ibid., 330.13/4–456)
9. Reference is to the meetings commemorating the 10th anniversary of the signing of the U.N. Charter in San Francisco the week of June 20, 1955.