Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961–1963, Volume VII, Arms Control and Disarmament

15. Telegram From the Delegation to the Geneva Conference on the Discontinuance of Nuclear Weapon Tests to the Department of State⁰

Geneva, April 21, 1961, 7 p.m.

Supnu 1549. From Dean for McCloy. We are trying to bring out what basically lies behind the tactics Sov Delegation has adopted since our resumption March 21. Sovs have not only stood still on positions they have been maintaining since the summit meeting last spring, but have appeared to go to great pains to cross the T’s and dot the I’s of their stand-still position in great detail and to make it clear that they are not budging in even the most minute particular from previous positions.

At the same time, Sov Delegation appears completely relaxed, is in no hurry to get anything done, and provides no indication that any Sov initiative is forthcoming in the near future to break up the conference. Indeed, they go to some length to demonstrate ostensible concern that the West might take some such action which they apparently don’t want to see happen.

We have tended to assume that the Sov Delegation’s instructions were to make no significant move away from the general framework of their present position but to keep the conference going inconclusively for an indefinite period and in effect they have made all of their concessions and the next move is up to us. One might think that if these were their instructions, they might, in order to keep things going, make some very minor moves on their positions, pointing to these as great concessions and use them as a basis to refute the association which, as of now, is so clearly justified, that they have made no move at all.

We are wondering if the Department has any ideas as to what explanation might be given for the Sov tactics. Several possibilities have occurred to us:

(A) The Sovs may merely be waiting us out in the expectation that the West has not yet laid all its cards on the table in the field of concessions and hope to move us to further concessions by standing pat. This possibility seems somewhat unlikely since the Sovs must realize it would be improbable that we would move further without any motion on their part.

(B) The Sovs may be in a general stall in the expectation of carrying negotiations on until general disarmament discussions begin with the idea of merging these talks into those discussions this summer. They may not feel under any compulsion to move beyond their present positions at this time to achieve this purpose.

(C) The Sovs may be hoarding any minor moves which they are prepared to make until there are much stronger indications that the West is getting impatient and considering a break-off of negotiations or a resumption of testing. In that case they might be expected to make such minor moves at the eleventh hour in order to frustrate any indicated move of the West towards a break-off or resumption of testing.

(D) They may be waiting until the French test gives them a pretext for a walk-out or until they can see what the French really accomplish.

(E) The Sov absolute stand on their present position may be designed to provoke us into taking the initiative to break-off the negotiations or to resume testing, thus giving them a good pretext for ending the negotiations and to put the blame on us. As we have said above, the ostensible attitude is that they do not want the negotiations broken off but this, of course, does not remove the possibility that they do want them ended so long as the onus is placed on us.

(F) The Sov Delegation may have been instructed just to sit tight while Moscow took a look, not so much as to what the West has to offer in this particular negotiation as to the general political situation between the US and USSR and Moscow’s basic decision on the conference here may not yet have been made.

We would appreciate any views the Department may have on what Sovs are up to.¹

0. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 397.5611-GE/4-2161. Confidential.
1. In Nusup 1192 to Geneva, April 26, drafted in EUR/SOV and D/P, the Department replied that evidence did not “warrant firm conclusion” that the Soviets were no longer interested in a test ban agreement, but that perhaps for them the degree of inspection demanded by the West was only acceptable in the context of an agreement on general disarmament. (Ibid.)