Office of the Historian

255. Memorandum of Conversation1

Washington, June 2, 1967, 11:30 a.m.–1:15 p.m.

SUBJECT

  • UK and EEC

PARTICIPANTS

  • Americans present:
    • Secretary of State
    • Secretary of the Treasury (part time)
    • Secretary of Defense
    • Ambassador Bruce
    • Mr. Walt Rostow (part time)
    • EUR—Mr. John M. Leddy
    • Mr. Francis Bator (part time)
    • S/CPR—Mr. James W. Symington
  • British present:
    • Sir Burke Trend, Secretary of the Cabinet
    • Sir Patrick Dean, Ambassador Admiral Sir Nigel Henderson, Head, British Defense Staff
    • Sir Solly Zuckerman, Chief Scientific Advisor
    • T. T. Brenchley, Assistant Secretary, Foreign Office
    • Donald Murray, Head, South East Asian Department, Foreign Office
    • A. N. Halls, Principal Private Secretary to Prime Minister
    • A. M. Palliser, Private Secretary to Prime Minister
    • T. D. Floyd-Hughes, Press Secretary to Prime Minister

UK and EEC

Mr. Bator raised this question. Answering the Secretary, Sir Burke Trend said that the British side had nothing more on the Rome Summit meetings of the Six than had appeared in the papers. The 5 seemed to be taking the problem more seriously than before. He personally was not as pessimistic as some over De Gaulle’s negative remarks at his last press conference, which seemed to him defensive.

The Secretary observed that the second British application, which was simple and clean, would be harder to resist than the first. Mr. Leddy thought that De Gaulle would not be able to veto the start of negotiations over the strong support of the 5 but could spin them out. Sir Burke Trend wondered aloud about how long the negotiations could go on but made no estimate.

The Secretary said that the US had been quiet in public about its support for British entry. He asked whether we should continue this policy. Sir Burke Trend said yes.

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The Secretary said we realized that in this process the British might have to “cock a snoot” at us from time to time and we understood this. Secretary Fowler added “but don’t sell us out on the liquidity problem.”

Mr. Rostow said that German Finance Minister Strauss had been impressed by the argument that British membership in the EEC would bring with it a great contribution in the technological field; this might be Britain’s strongest card. The UK side observed that the technological argument was simply another way of spelling out the advantages of a large market. Sir Solly Zuckerman referred in this connection to a recent Department of Commerce article on “Innovation” which was having a very powerful effect in Europe in reinforcing the Common Market idea.

  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, EEC 6 UK. Secret. Drafted by Leddy and approved by the White House and S on June 14. The conversation was held in the Cabinet Room of the White House. The source text is labeled “Part IV of IV.”↩