Office of the Historian

289. Memorandum of Conversation0

PVC/MC–10
Ottawa, July 10, 1958, 4:30 p.m.

PRESIDENT’s VISIT TO CANADA

Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, July 8–11, 1958

PARTICIPANTS

  • United States
    • The Secretary of State
    • The Hon. Tyler Thompson
    • Mr. Joseph N. Greene, Jr.
  • Canada
    • Secretary of State for External Affairs Sidney Smith
    • Under-Secretary of State for External Affairs Jules Léger
    • Asst. Under Secretary of State for External Affairs W.D. Matthews
    • Mr. John Holmes

SUBJECT

  • Secretary’s Talk with De Gaulle

At Mr. Smith’s request, the Secretary briefly outlined his talks with General De Gaulle in Paris. He said that he thought that the General had for the last ten years been thinking almost entirely about French problems, to the virtual exclusion of international problems. He outlined De Gaulle’s ideas on constitutional reform and on Algeria and Africa [Page 721] and said that he thought these were all good and he found them encouraging. The Secretary said he had not found so encouraging De Gaulle’s views on international questions. He referred to the General’s deprecatory remarks about the Coal and Steel Community and the new supranational institutions in Europe and to the General’s views on the importance of states as such in international affairs. He noted that De Gaulle had, however, said that under him the French Government would honor the commitments to the European treaties.

The Secretary also mentioned briefly General De Gaulle’s ideas on NATO and his apparent hope that a sort of directorate, or executive committee of NATO, comprising the United States, the United Kingdom and France could be established; General De Gaulle had reflected the thought that this alignment would be well suited to run most of the free world. The Secretary said that he had rebutted this line of thought with the view that while the strongest powers obviously have the greatest influence in world affairs, they could not effectively exercise that influence if they tried to do so in obvious concert.

In response to Mr. Smith’s inquiry, the Secretary said he did not think De Gaulle was likely to kick over the traces and try to make a deal on his own with the Russians. The Secretary said that while there may be troublesome moments in relations with De Gaulle, even more important is the fact that if he is successful in the things he has set out to do he can save us all some great dangers.

The Secretary also outlined the thoughts he had expressed to General De Gaulle on why it would be preferable for France to subscribe to the NATO atomic weapons stockpile idea, with the added assurance of immediate availability of the weapons to France in the event of armed attack on France or her forces, rather than launch into a national nuclear weapons program. He said that he did not think General De Gaulle had fully understood the significance of what the Secretary had proposed.

On the current Geneva talks, the Secretary repeated the views that he had expressed earlier at lunch.1

  1. Source: Eisenhower Library, Staff Secretary Records, DDE Canada Memcons. Confidential. Prepared by Greene. The meeting was held at the Department of External Affairs.↩
  2. See Document 286.↩