133. 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
Dear Fran And David:2 Number 6 in my “atmospheric” letters3 can describe a generally more favorable development here, (a) in terms of our relationship with our Western colleagues and (b) through clarifying Gromyko’s position on a basis which could help us gain public support for our own approach.
I think that the Governor did a fine job this week. As our telegram of April 10 (Disarmament #104)4 indicated, we were really headed for some difficulties in the Subcommittee and in the “off-the-record” meeting of April 12 because of differences in approach among the four Western powers. Our telegram 4584 (Disarmament #107)5 indicates how we came out, but in my opinion does not give enough credit to Nutting, who really helped us out of a difficult situation with Moch, since the latter’s instinct for a logical French categorization of issues could well have resulted in the apparent agreements among the five Subcommittee members being over-emphasized and taken out of context, the present basic differences between the quadripartite group, and the USSR being minimized, and the differences within the quadripartite being highlighted. I think that Moch behaved in these meetings in exemplary fashion, but it was Nutting who really pulled us through and secured agreement on the approach to be taken in the “off-the-record” meeting.
It is hard for me to tell the degree to which the Governor takes “hard” positions as a tactical means of gaining an objective lesser than the one he apparently seeks. In our Four Power meeting of April 10, described in our telegram 4551, he gave the impression of a much more inflexible US attitude toward disarmament and the relationship between disarmament and political settlements than he actually holds, but the following day took a somewhat milder position which contributed to the working out of agreement among the four Western powers. In this connection, Deptel 6060 of April 126 was helpful in confirming [Page 373] Stassen on the line he had taken in the off-the-record meeting of April 12. I do not believe that in my summary of this meeting, in our telegram 4610 (Disarmament #108)7 I have given an adequate enough explanation of just what happened on this point of relationship between political settlements and disarmament. At one stage, Nutting had said that the UK would not commence the second stage of the Anglo-French plan unless there were reunification of Germany in freedom. Gromyko shortly thereafter asked Stassen if it was correct that the US paper was not dependent upon political settlements but that further measures of disarmament would involve a settlement of the German problem. Stassen replied that the US believed it would be desirable to have a prompt solution of the German problem tomorrow if possible, even though we did not solve any other problem. Contrarywise, it would be desirable to solve the German problem concurrently with other issues. He said that, parallel to this position, the US believed we could come down to 2.5 million men without previous settlement of any of the major world problems but could not go lower unless there were some important settlements of outstanding problems. He said the US was not rigid on details but believed that a start could be made on reductions, both conventional and nuclear, under the present world situation; that this start would improve the atmosphere for settling other international issues; and this in turn could lead to other disarmament measures.
As you can see, Mr. Stassen was quite careful not to hook further disarmament measures specifically to a settlement of the German problem, but to talk in terms of settling major international issues.
The off-the-record meeting on the 12th was useful because it produced the statements of the US position which I have described above, showed up Gromyko’s position as calling for 1.5 million force levels without any political settlements while perpetuating the division of Germany and in effect forcing withdrawal of US forces from the continent, and induced strong French and UK statements on the German problem. However, none of the Western delegations believe that this is Gromyko’s last position and consider that a more forthcoming proposal will be made, probably during the Khrushchev-Bulganin visit. No one is sure just what will be the nature of the proposal, although most of us believe that it will include something in the nuclear field.
Incidentally, there is one point on which the Governor and Nutting were in disagreement and on which I support Nutting’s interpretation. This is the question of the extent to which the general Soviet position has a favorable impact on public opinion in Europe. Mr. Stassen believes that the USSR’s position is so obviously impossible in [Page 374] calling for very low force levels without doing anything in the nuclear field and without settling any major political issues that these deficiencies are recognized, while Nutting believes that the USSR approach has considerable popular appeal because it is simple and ostensibly is a concession seeking agreement in the conventional field while deferring the difficult nuclear questions. I believe that we will need to make careful explanations in our information media output concerning just what is the meaning of the present Soviet plan, as opposed to our more realistic and balanced approach, if we are to have favorable impact on public opinion.
One final point. I wish to call to your attention the statement made by the Governor in the April 13 meeting of the Subcommittee, page 4 of the verbatim.8 It is not reported in the telegram on that meeting (Embtel 4633, Disarmament 109).9 After referring to Section II, paragraph 3 of the Soviet proposal, the Governor said:
“In this respect, we would understand the Soviet view as being similar to our own—namely, that the staff of inspectors of the international control organ would not be told: “You shall proceed to see whether you can find the military units; the stores of military equipment and ammunition; the land, naval and air bases; and the factories manufacturing conventional armaments and ammunition’. That would not be the procedure. Rather, the nation being inspected would provide a list of these items to the inspectors of the control organ, and those inspectors would be given unimpeded access to the objects of control, in order to establish to their satisfaction the correctness of the information furnished by the nation being inspected. That, as we see it, is the procedure reflected in the United States working paper.” It seems to me, as it does to Ed Gullion, that this is much too restricted in interpretation of what is required by the inspection and control system for safety’s sake.
This is all for the present. I look forward to hearing from you soon.
Respectfully,
- Source: Department of State, Central Files, 600.0012/4–1656. Confidential. A copy was sent to Bond.↩
- Though Meyers’ letter was addressed to Wilcox, the salutation also included presumably David Wainhouse.↩
- For Meyers’ third and fourth letters, March 23 and April 5, see Documents 128 and 129, respectively.↩
- Not printed. (Department of State, Central Files, 330.13/4–1056)↩
- Not printed. (Ibid., 330.13/4–1156)↩
- Not printed. (Ibid., 330.13/4–956)↩
- Not printed. (Ibid., 330.13/4–1356)↩
- The verbatim record of the 80th meeting of the subcommittee, April 13, is not printed. (Ibid., IO Files: Lot 70 A 6871, DC/SC.1/PV.80)↩
- Not printed. (Ibid., Central Files, 330.13/4–1356)↩