Office of the Historian

370. Memorandum of Conversation1

New York, August 20, 1958, 9:45 p.m.
[Facsimile Page 1]

PARTICIPANTS

    • United States
    • The Secretary
    • Mr. Reinhardt
    • Mr. Greene
    • United Kingdom
    • Mr. Lloyd
    • Sir William Hayter
    • Mr. A. R. Moore
    • Mr. Dennis Lasky

SUBJECT

  • Statement on Suspension of Nuclear Testing

The Secretary showed Mr. Lloyd the draft of a statement proposed to be made by the President on suspension of nuclear testing. In a lengthy discussion Mr. Lloyd argued that unless there be established in the statement a relationship between our readiness to suspend testing and Soviet willingness to join in negotiations for an agreement to supervise suspension of testing, we would give away to the Soviets [Typeset Page 1432] without exacting any price an essential indeed fundamental part of our position.

As a result of this discussion, the Secretary agreed to insert at the beginning of the fourth paragraph the phrase “If this is accepted in principle”, so as to establish the link between the two parts of our statement.

  1. Source: Statement on suspension of nuclear testing. Confidential. 1 p. NARA, RG 59, Secretary’s Memoranda of Conversation: Lot 64 D 199.↩