Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XII, Western Europe

5. Telegram from the Department of State to the Embassy in Denmark ¹

Washington, January 28, 1968, 2334Z.

106092. Personal for Ambassador and Blankinship. Following memcon is uncleared FYI and subject to revision upon review.

1. Ambassador Ronne was received by the Secretary at 2:15 p.m. Jan 28² and stated Krag had instructed him to seek US approval of the statement text of which already sent us by Amb White: “The Danish Govt which has had contacts with the US Govt is in a position to confirm that in conformity with Danish atomic policy there are no nuclear weapons in Greenland, and no overflights of Greenland by planes carrying such weapons are undertaken.”

2. Secretary stated he wished to make two observations: (a) Danish as well as US security depends upon US nuclear arrangements from which those countries receiving this protection cannot claim complete disassociation as if nuclear weapons did not exist, and (b) we have serious problem of how to deal with events in one country so as not to set up a chain reaction with other countries throughout world that could impair the American nuclear deterrent. To deal with this second problem we have adopted the policy of neither confirming nor denying the presence of our nuclear weapons and have adhered to it rigidly. There is a difference between what the United States can say and what Denmark can say.

3. The Secretary noted that the proposed Danish statement associates it with the United States thus putting the United States in the position of confirming it, a departure from our policy. He then gave the Ambassador the following shorter statement and asked if the Danish Government might wish to say something along these lines: “The Danish Government confirms that there are no nuclear weapons stored in Greenland and no overflights of Greenland with nuclear weapons.” The Secretary stressed that if we were queried about such a statement issued by the Danish Government, we would refuse to comment. While we deeply regretted the crash, Danish public opinion is the Danish Government’s problem, not ours, and one to be dealt with by a purely Danish statement.

4. Should any question of violation of our international obligations arise, the Secretary reminded the Ambassador of the secret understandings referred to in Assistant Secretary Leddy’s informal memorandum to the Ambassador. (Nodis Deptels 106058 and 106059.)³ The Ambassador stated that he had been instructed to comment along the following lines on this point: “In light of the background of later developments, the Danish Govt considered that the historical observations made in the memorandum are considered to be without importance in the prevailing concrete situation.” In that connection, the Ambassador referred to the many public pronouncements on Danish nuclear policy since the signing of the Greenland Agreement in 1951,⁴ including a statement in Parliament in April 1964 that Danish nuclear policy includes Greenland.

5. The Secretary replied that if the interpretation of “no importance” means that the question of the understandings is merely being put aside, that would cause no problem; but we could not accept an interpretation of it by which we could be accused of violating our understandings with Denmark.

6. Replying to the Ambassador’s inquiry about the question of future overflights, the Secretary said he thought the text given the Ambassador covered the immediate problem and the question of the future could be left to the new government.

7. The Amb mentioned the possibility of Foreign Minister Tabor coming to the United States to discuss the problem. The Secretary made remarks which made it clear to Ronne that such a visit would not be welcome. He regretted that he would be completely tied up with the Korean problem and would not be in a position to receive the Foreign Minister on Monday, after which time Tabor might not be in office. The Ambassador commented that there was probably nothing more that Tabor could accomplish in any event. He said he would promptly inform Krag of our proposal.⁵

Rusk

1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Denmark, Vol. 1. Top Secret; Immediate; Nodis. Drafted by McKillop and approved by Leddy.
2. Just prior to meeting with Rusk, Ronne met with Leddy. A memorandum of their conversation is in the National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1967-69, DEF 17.
3. See Document 3 and footnote 3 thereto.
4. See footnote 2, Document 4.
5. On January 29 the Danish Government issued the following statement: “The Danish Government confirms that there are no nuclear weapons stored in Greenland and no overflights of Greenland with nuclear weapons.” (Telegram 106766 to all NATO capitals, January 29; National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files, 1967-69, DEF 17 US)