333. Memorandum of Conversation Between Strauss and Herter1
I telephoned Admiral Strauss this morning and told him Prime Minister McMillan had just written the President a letter stating that he is most anxious, now that the Congress appears to have approved the exchange of information on atomic weapons, to begin discussions as soon as possible. McMillan wants to send experts over here as soon as he is given the high sign. I told Admiral Strauss I understood June 16th would be the earliest date we would be in a position to talk to the British. We feel that we should have a completed draft of our own before we start discussions with them, but that, if at all possible, we should have such a draft before June 16th. Admiral Strauss said his people are at work on a preliminary draft now, that he would see how it stood and call me back this morning.
Admiral Strauss telephoned me a little later to say that his people have been working on the draft bilateral for some time. There have been some minor differences between them and Defense and they had been allowing time to straighten these out. However, he thinks they are relatively immaterial. Admiral Strauss said we could say to McMillan that we would be in a position to have preliminary discussions with Plowden when he arrives next Wednesday, and shortly thereafter would communicate with him about a time for the British team of experts to come over. Plowden will then have had a chance to review what we have and we will be in a better position to decide on the timing.
- Source: Reply to Macmillan’s letter. Confidential. 1 p. NARA, RG 59, Secretary’s Memoranda of Conversation: Lot 64 D 199.↩