204. Informal Record of a Meeting, Secretary Dulles’ Office, Department of State, Washington, May 24, 1957, 2 p.m.1

PARTICIPANTS

  • Department of State
    • The Secretary
    • The Under Secretary
    • Mr. Bowie
    • Mr. Reinhardt
    • Mr. Walmsley
    • Governor Stassen
    • Ambassador Peaslee
    • The Vice President
  • White House
    • General Cutler
  • AEC
    • Admiral Strauss
  • Defense Department
    • Secretary Quarles
    • Admiral Radford
    • Mr. Sprague
    • (Numerous working level officers from the agencies were also present.)
  • CIA
    • Mr. Allen Dulles

SUBJECT

  • Disarmament Proposal

In preparation for a meeting with the President on May 25,2 the group discussed for three and one-half hours Governor Stassen’s May 9 proposals as modified by his May 22 memorandum to the Secretary of State.3

The discussion brought out various issues and the areas of agreement and disagreement thereon which would be submitted to the President and which are described in the attached sheets.

JG

[Attachment]

2.4 All signators (except the US, UK, and USSR) to agree they are prohibited from the manufacture or use of nuclear weapons.

Suggested Issues:

1.
To what extent does the spread of nuclear weapons capability to fourth countries present a substantial threat to US security?
2.
How should the use of nuclear weapons by fourth nations be treated?

Basis of Agreement or Disagreement:

1.
Quarles, Radford (and apparently Strauss) questioned whether spread to fourth nations is a serious threat to US security. The Secretary, Allen Dulles and Stassen considered that the spread does entail serious risks for US security and that no undue concessions were being made by us on this point.
2.
All agree that the proposal should be modified to allow the use of nuclear weapons by fourth countries in case of an attack on the same basis as they would be usable by one of the three countries possessing nuclear weapons.
5.
Upon the establishment of satisfactorily functioning inspection system and the cut-off on production of nuclear materials for weapons purposes, the USSR, UK, and US will commence agreed equitable proportionate transfers of fissionable materials in successive increments from previous production over to internationally inspected and supervised non-weapons purposes, including stockpiling either national or international; provided, however, that these transfers shall be carried out to only a limited degree and each of the three will be maintaining a very substantial nuclear weapons capability in so far as the terms of the treaty for the partial agreement is concerned.

Issues:

1.
What should be the basis of the respective transfers by the US, USSR, and UK?
2.
Should the amount of the specific transfers be stated in an initial agreement or determined later?

Substantial Consensus:

The initial agreement should fix the ratios, and preferably the exact amounts, of the specific transfers by the US, USSR, and UK. As an initial negotiating position, the US should request that the USSR transfer amounts equal to our own transfers. The UK transfer should be nominal. If agreement cannot be reached on the above basis of equality, Stassen should request further instruction.

6. Upon the effective date of the treaty (estimated as July 1958), the USSR and US and other states concerned will move promptly to install and begin to operate an aerial inspection system in accordance with the approved Eisenhower method in initial zones, including

a)
all of the Soviet Union north of the Arctic Circle (including the Murmansk Kola Peninsular and Dikson areas) and all of the Soviet Union east of 108 degrees East Longitude (from Lake Baikal to Bering Straits); and an equal geographic area of Alaska, Canada, and Western US.
b)
all of the Soviet Union west of 27 and one-half degrees East Longitude (Minsk–Zhmerinka line) and all of the territory of Europe between 2 and one-half degrees East Longitude and 27 and one-half degrees East Longitude and between 42 degrees, 20 minutes, North Latitude and 63 degrees North Latitude. (Labelled as the Russian and European zone for convenience in this cable.)

Suggested Issue:

Scope of aerial and ground inspection zones.

[Page 548]

Areas of Agreement or Disagreement:

1.
In view of the effects on our NATO allies and the complexity of the multi national interests involved, the European-Russian aerial and ground control zones should be treated separately from the US-USSR zone in so far as possible, and should be handled in a way allowing Europeans to have a full voice in the development of the position.
2.
As an initial negotiating position for American-Russian aerial and ground control zones, the US should propose that our side include continental US, Alaska, and Canada, and the Soviet side include all Soviet territory. If the Soviets continue to refuse to deal on this basis the US should move to a limited initial zone—in order to start an inspection technique—which would comprise roughly the entire area north of the Arctic Circle, all of Alaska, the Aleutian Islands, the Kamchatka Peninsula, and the Kuriles Islands. Stassen felt that since the Russians have come forward with an offer of inspection over a large area of the USSR, the US should counter initially with an offer of a large area of the US before moving to a very limited inspection zone. Stassen also believes that the Soviets will not agree to a US-USSR inspection zone without simultaneous agreement on a European zone.
10.
Within the following nine months after furnishing the blueprints (estimated July 1959), the USSR and the US would (in the manner outlined by US JCS in the Secretary of Defense letter of October 30, 19565) place in internationally supervised national storage in disarmament depots 15% of the major designated armaments reported in their blueprints, including nuclear weapon-delivery vehicles, and would reduce their armed forces to two and one-half million and would bring the level of their military expenditures down by 15%.

Issue:

What kind of reductions in armaments should be provided in the agreement in the initial stage while the inspection system is being installed?

Basis of Disagreement:

1.
Quarles believes that the agreement should leave to each country to decide for itself what armaments should be put in depots. He asserted that the timing of inspection would not justify any specific prior agreement regarding types and amounts of weapons to be mothballed.
2.
Stassen considered that the agreement should specifically provide the amounts of designated armaments to be put in mothballs on the ground that this was necessary as a beginning and would not entail undue risks in view of the method of mothballing, the size of the reductions, and the immediate subsequent inspection.

Paragraphs 16, 19, 20, 21, and 22. These paragraphs all deal with a second phase following the successful implementation of the first phase.

Issue:

Should our position contain such detailed provisions regarding a second phase of reduction?

Consensus:

1.
It is not wise to spell out in this much detail a second phase of reduction.
2.
US should state that it would be prepared to negotiate for major reductions in armaments and armed forces if the first phase succeeded.
3.
Stassen thought a reference to a floor of 1.5 million was most desirable; Quarles felt the figure should not be less than 2 million.
18.
Upon the effective date of the partial agreement treaty (estimated as July 1958) all signators would be committed to a temporary suspension for 12 months of all nuclear tests and during such 12 months to cooperate in the design of an agreed inspection system which would support the nuclear materials cut-off commitment, and which would also verify either an agreement for limitation on the amount of fissionable material released per year into the atmosphere by the three in future tests, or to verify a continued limited suspension of tests. The agreement to be so drawn that a failure to agree upon and to install the inspection system involved for these two commitments or the failure to agree on either a limitation of tests or further suspension of tests beyond the 12 months would automatically result in no legal commitments against tests after the 12 months.

Issue:

Should nuclear tests be suspended, even temporarily, prior to adequately inspected cut-off of output of nuclear weapons and the beginning of inspected transfers from weapons stockpiles to peaceful uses?

Basis of Disagreement:

1.
Strauss considers this issue should be answered “no”, but suggested some intermediate positions.
2.
Stassen considers his proposal to be necessary for coping with the Fourth Nation problem and for obtaining Russian agreement.
3.
Quarles believes that the agreement should contain (a)6 positive provisions, including setting up an International Commission to monitor and eventually to control tests and (b) undertaking that next tests would be 12 months ahead coupled with a U.S. statement that we might cancel tests if there were further agreement.7
23.
The signators agree that within three months after the effective date of the treaty (estimated to be October 1958) they will cooperate in the establishment of a technical committee to design inspection controls (and upon reaching an agreed definition, to install them) to fulfill a commitment that sending objects through outer space and sending unmanned objects over distances in excess of medium range at any altitude, shall be exclusively for peaceful and scientific purposes, and further designed to verify and insure compliance with a commitment not to build or to install intercontinental ballistic or guided missiles or rockets.

This paragraph deals with the control of rockets intercontinental ballistic and guided missiles.

Issue:

Should this type of weapon be separated out for special treatment?

Basis of Agreement and Disagreement:

The Secretary, Allen Dulles, and Stassen favored this paragraph which reflects existing policy already put forward in the Disarmament meeting. Quarles expressed some doubt.

  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 600.0012/5–2457. Secret. Drafted by Greene.
  2. See Document 206.
  3. Documents 195 and 200.
  4. The numbers at the beginning of these paragraphs refer to the numbered paragraphs in Document 195.
  5. Document 164.
  6. Section “(a)”was inserted in handwriting and deleted from its position immediately preceding the word “contain”.
  7. Section (b) of this paragraph originally read: “undertaking to suspend tests for 12 months if coupled with a US statement that we would thereafter resume tests in the absence of further agreement.” The deletion and addition of words to this section were handwritten.