Office of the Historian

285. Memorandum of Conversation1

Washington, September 20, 1968, 12:30 p.m.

PARTICIPANTS

  • The Secretary
  • Ambassador Dobrynin
  • Assistant Secretary Leddy

Ambassador Dobrynin had asked to see the Secretary either today or on Monday.2 The Secretary agreed to see him at 12:30 p.m. today.

Dobrynin began by referring to the question of technical talks on PNEDS (Peaceful Nuclear Explosive Devices). He said that the idea of the US and the USSR meeting on this subject had been at the US initiative, that the US thought it would be useful with the non-nuclear conference in Geneva and that the Soviets were now prepared to go ahead with the talks on October 7, as suggested by the US. The Secretary asked whether this subject had been discussed with Ambassador Foster when he and Dobrynin met the other day.3 Dobrynin replied that they had just discussed the NPT and that Ambassador Foster did not wish to discuss the PNEDS talks.

The Secretary said that he would have to discuss this question with the President and Ambassador Foster, and that he would let Dobrynin know later. He observed that there were complications.

The Secretary said that the Executive Branch, as the Ambassador knew, was attempting to move the non-proliferation treaty through the Senate. In response to the Ambassador’s question, he said he thought the matter would not come to a vote before the Fortas nomination had been settled,4 probably not until the end of the month.

[Here follows discussion of Berlin and Germany.]

  1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Rostow Files, Non-Proliferation, Box 11. Drafted by Leddy and approved by John P. Walsh (S/S) on September 24.↩
  2. September 23.↩
  3. Document 283.↩
  4. President Johnson nominated Abe Fortas, an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, to be Chief Justice on June 26.↩