Foreign Relations of the United States, 1958–1960, Western Europe, Volume VII, Part 2

82. Telegram From Secretary of State Dulles to the Department of State⁰

Paris, December 15, 1958, 11 p.m.

Dulte 2. Eyes Only Acting Secretary for President from Secretary.

Dear Mr. President: We had this morning the first meeting of the US-Canadian Ministerial Commission on Joint Defense.¹ This was the body which, you will recall, we agreed to when we were in Ottawa together last July.² As anticipated, the meeting served more as scenery than as a place for substantive debate although a few interesting points came up. The atmosphere was cordial and I am confident that the meeting will improve our Canadian relations.

Then I had a meeting with General Norstad,³ who wanted to see me before I saw De Gaulle. He outlined the series of obstructive tactics which he was encountering on the part of the French. I also suggested to him that he might consider a few quiet moves, the significance of which would not be lost on the Russians, to indicate we were tightening up for the Berlin situation.

The big event was my meeting this afternoon with General de Gaulle.⁴ We were together for an hour and a half and I am bound to say that it was a most unsatisfactory meeting. He was entirely correct and cordial personally but obviously irritated by our failure yesterday to vote against the Algerian independence resolution in the UN and also our failure to cooperate with them to try to hold up the admission of Guinea to the UN. Basically, however, he went back to his letter to you and made it emphatic that France wanted to establish a definite three-party organization composed of France, UK and US, which would make global policy and deal with the use of nuclear weapons, etc. He also made it clear that France was not interested in cooperating with NATO on infrastructure, atomic stockpiles, IRBM’s and the like when in effect the whole show was being run by the US. I told him that while I thought there could be informal exchanges of views which would be useful, I was convinced there could not be any formal organization of the kind that he envisaged. I do not know what the outcome will be. I think we can make a greater effort at Washington to make them feel that they are in on important decisions and then see whether that in fact brings a dividend in terms of more cooperation with NATO.

We talked about Berlin, and I found De Gaulle quite solid on this point. He specifically mentioned that he had no intention of taking a separate line on Berlin out of resentment at what he considers our separate lines in other affairs.

He sent his best wishes to you. I spoke of the possibility of his coming to the US, but he was very vague and indefinite about this.

Tonight Norstad is giving a big dinner party which I shall forego to conserve strength for the NATO meeting which formally opens tomorrow morning.⁵

Faithfully yours, FOSTER.

Dulles

0. Source: Department of State, Conference Files: Lot 64 D 560, CF 1179. Secret.
1. See Part 1, Document 292.
2. Regarding Eisenhower’s and Dulles’ visit to Ottawa July 8–11, see Part 1, Documents 280 ff.
3. See Document 80 and footnote 4, Document 81.
4. See Document 81.
5. On December 16, Eisenhower replied: “I hasten to assure you that I fully understand your feeling of frustration after your two long conferences yesterday afternoon. It does seem that our friend should cease insisting upon attempting to control the whole world, of course with partners, even before he has gotten France itself in good order.” This message was transmitted in Tedul 7 to Paris, December 16. (Department of State, Central Files, 611.51/12–1658)