320. Memorandum From Secretary of State Vance to President Carter1
1. Talks with South Africans on Nuclear Issue: Dick Moose and Joe Nye met informally November 10 with Brand Fourie and Ambassador Sole to review nuclear matters. We told the South Africans that if they adhered to the NPT and agreed to interim safeguards on the Valindaba enrichment plant, we would furnish low enriched uranium for the Koeberg reactors. We stressed our continuing concern about developments at Kalahari and the importance we attach to moving ahead urgently to determine whether we can reach an agreement.
[Page 974]Fourie and Sole indicated that Vorster’s original assurances stand. Fourie denied that Kalahari was a nuclear test site, declined to say what its purpose is, but suggested that we may soon have access to information which will clarify its actual nature. On fuel for the Safari-I reactor, the South Africans showed some interest in the possibility of converting the facility to use low enriched fuel. The discussion left unclear the extent to which agreement on HEU fuel would be a prerequisite for the SAG taking the steps we have stipulated, but Fourie indicated that if all we could do is supply fuel for the Koeberg reactors, then the prospects for nuclear cooperation are nil. The SAG remains concerned about our insistence on interim safeguards on Valindaba, and more generally about the possibility that regardless of assurances we might give now, US policy might change in the future thus undermining any agreement. We noted that a nuclear relationship with South Africa would entail costs and risks for us as well as for them.
Fourie is interested in having Ambassador Smith come to South Africa for talks in January; we tentatively agreed provided there was a clear, specific and mutually agreed basis for fairly final talks by then. This will require further groundwork including a reply to Vorster’s letter2 in the near future.
[Omitted here is material unrelated to South Africa.]
- Source: Carter Library, Plains File, Subject File, Box 38, State Department Evening Reports, 11/77. Secret. Carter initialed the memorandum.↩
- See Document 311.↩