Office of the Historian

363. Memorandum of Conference with the President1

Washington, August 20, 1958, 11:15 a.m.
[Facsimile Page 1]

OTHERS PRESENT

  • Secretary Herter
  • Dr. Killian
  • General Persons
  • Mr. Hagerty
  • General Goodpaster

The meeting was held to discuss the timing of the statement of test suspension, and the timing of notification to the Congress concerning the statement. Secretary Herter said that the timing problems are very difficult, and that much remains to be brought together before the statement is issued. It would be possible, he indicated, to take a calculated gamble that the effect would not be lost by waiting another week until the report of the Geneva negotiations is filed and made public. The special significance of August 21st is the signing of the agreement in Geneva. If we should wait, however, we run the risk that the Soviets would launch some sort of propaganda campaign which would deprive us of the effect we are seeking through our action.

The President asked if we had received any reply from the British as to their agreement with our proposed action, and Secretary Herter said we had not. The President said he understood that the item that is causing a great deal of difficulty in our own government is the ruling out of peaceful detonations during the period while an agreement is being negotiated. He thought a reasonable solution would be to permit these to continue. Secretary Herter said he understood there were some scientific objections to this, in that it would open the way for possible cheating by the Soviets. He said that the period of unilateral suspension could be cut down to nine months and we could negotiate with the Soviets during that period concerning peaceful explosions. The disadvantage to the nine months period is that we would seem to be planning to discontinue simply until we were ready to start another test series the middle of next year.

[Facsimile Page 2]

There was then discussion as to the best means of notifying the Congress, and the President said he thought the best course was to ask Mr. Rayburn and Senator Johnson to get the appropriate leaders together, one group in the House and one group in the Senate.

A.J. Goodpaster
Brigadier General, USA
  1. Source: Statement on cessation of nuclear testing. Secret. 2 pp. Eisenhower Library, Whitman File, DDE Diaries. Drafted on August 25.↩