501.BC Atomic/9–2148
Memorandum by the Deputy United States Representative to the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission (Osborn) to the Director of the Office of United Nations Affairs (Rusk)
Subject: Talk with General McNaughton on atomic energy in the General Assembly.
At lunch today General McNaughton told me that he had this morning talked with the Canadian Prime Minister1 and that their views were identical and would be strongly pressed. General McNaughton expressed them as follows:
They desire the General Assembly to confirm the General Findings and Recommendations of the First Report, the Specific Proposals of the Second Report, and the Report and Recommendations of the Third Report, and to press immediately for the sponsorship of a resolution to this effect by the fourteen nations of the majority. They suggest a conference at the earliest possible date with the delegates of the permanent members, to agree on the exact form of the resolution, following which agreement would be urged on the others of the fourteen.
I will follow this up with General McNaughton, the French, British, Chinese, and probably the Belgians. This conference should be held in the next few days.
In addition to the above attitude on atomic energy, General McNaughton and the Canadian Prime Minister are strongly opposed to the entire British position—the lumping of Article 43, CCA and AEC together, and getting into a general debate on the subject of Soviet intransigence, veto, etc. General McNaughton feels that this [Page 429] would confuse the atomic energy debate, that we are not ready for “the debate on the other matters because they have not yet been brought far enough along, and says that the Canadian Delegation will bitterly oppose this British view. However, the Canadian Delegation desires to continue the work of the CCA until it has been brought to approximately the present position of the AEC, when it can then be reported to the General Assembly and debated there.
- William Lyon Mackenzie King, Prime Minister and Chairman of the Canadian Delegation to the General Assembly.↩