493. Letter From Acting Secretary of Defense Gilpatric to the Deputy Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs (Johnson)1

Dear Alex:

On further consideration of the Canadian-United Kingdom proposal that we join in an assessment of the prospects of a multilateral convention concerning the breadth of the territorial sea and fisheries [Page 1110] jurisdiction, referred to in my letter of 25 May 1961,2 I have concluded that it might be useful to provide you with our analysis of the anticipated support for and opposition to such an endeavor.

In this analysis the following basic assumptions have been made: (1) that the provisions of the proposed multilateral, when offered for signature, would be exactly the same as the proposal which received fifty four affirmative votes at the 1960 Conference in Geneva, Switzerland (i.e., the United States-Canadian proposal plus the Brazil amendment); (2) that the United States and the West European Governments would support and strongly urge others to support a prospective multilateral on the terms mentioned; (3) that United States fishing interests and congressmen and their European counterparts’ opposition to the prospective multilateral will be moderate or promptly and effectively overcome.

It is estimated that the maximum number of states which could be persuaded to sign the prospective multilateral is 30 to 35. This range is arrived at on the basis of analysis which indicates that there are 42 reasonably possible adherents. Of these 42, 12 are virtually certain adherents and 11 are substantially doubtful. We resolve the unknown factor on the basis of past experience and conclude that we might persuade 65 to 85 per cent of those in the reasonably possible category to sign the prospective multilateral.

If we attracted the maximum of 35 signatories, there would be left remaining 77 non-signatories (counting Communist China, East Germany, outer Mongolia and Kuwait).

Of the 77 who are regarded as not reasonably possible adherents to a prospective multilateral on the terms mentioned, at least 36 are known to be strongly opposed to the terms of the prospective multilateral and to be strongly in favor of a twelve mile territorial sea.

If, as is considered likely, this nucleus of 36 were to attempt to protect its position by creating a twelve mile multilateral, it is estimated that as many as 50 signatories could be achieved and the reasonable possibilities run as high as 57 to 60.

On the basis of our analysis we conclude that the United States should not engage in attempting to promote a multilateral treaty on the terms mentioned. On the contrary, it is urged that the United States should seek to dissuade Canada and the United Kingdom from further efforts in this direction.

Our conclusions are buttressed by a further consideration: even if our estimate of support for the prospective multilateral proved to be [Page 1111] fundamentally in error, and as many as fifty signatories could be attracted, the resulting 50 state multilateral treaty would constitute no current net benefit and would very likely result in a substantial current net detriment. The reason for this conclusion is the circumstance that we could only attract the adherence of “friends”, in any case. Their adherence to the treaty contemplated offers no current security advantages. The making of such a treaty, however, would surely harden the attitude of the opposition and that result could be substantially detrimental to current security interests.

Sincerely,

Roswell Gilpatric
  1. Source: National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1960–63, 399.731/7–2461. Confidential.
  2. Document 490.