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

73. Telegram From the Mission to the United Nations to the Department of State⁰

New York, September 18, 1961, 9 p.m.

797. US-USSR bilaterals.¹ Deliver President by 8:00 a.m. From McCloy and Dean. Further to our telephone conversation on the subject of the Soviet acceptance of our Statement of Principles² with the exception of one sentence, Dean and I are inclined on balance to recommend we delete the sentence and record agreement on the statement as it stands.³

While we sense the possible political disadvantages of reaching an agreement on principles which could be portrayed to be more meaningful than it actually is at this time, we believe this must be weighed against the political difficulties of refusing to agree after we have gone so far in pursuing these bilateral talks with the avowed purpose of reaching agreement. Such a refusal, after Soviet acceptance of our proposal in total with the exception of one sentence, could be used to our political disadvantage as indicating we are seeking a pretext to avoid agreement. If the Soviets were asking us to change our fundamental position in deleting the sentence in question or if there was anything in the remaining text which was inconsistent with our position, it would be one thing; however, this is not the case. They agree that the substantive question could be reserved for future discussion, without prejudice to the US position or theirs.

Our position in refusing to accept this would seem artificial since it would represent a reversal of our previous position, which was that the US was prepared to go into substantive negotiations without any agreement on principles. It may be regarded as strange if now, after the Soviets have accepted so much of our language on principles including much that is helpful to us, we in effect refuse to agree on a framework for future negotiations because one point is disagreed. Furthermore, agreement would break Soviet monopoly on general and complete disarmament, and give it a distinctly American twist. It would also be consistent with our general posture of willingness to explore possibilities for negotiations with Soviets.

We are not minimizing the importance of the sentence at issue. But we believe we can make it quite clear that in omitting the sentence we are not at this time requiring the explicit settlement of this particular issue as a precondition to resumption of the negotiations which we have gone on record as seeking even without a Statement of Principles ever since they were broken off in June 1960 by the Soviets.

If this clause is removed from para 6, or if it is replaced with language not explicitly affirming US position re clandestine activities, which we will try to obtain, we believe our position would still be fully safeguarded in future negotiations for following reasons:

• First, we have already handed Soviets memorandum officially stating our position in strongest terms; we would file this memorandum with UN and make it part of public record.
• Second, we would make any omission or modification of last clause of para 6 subject of a letter from me to Zorin in which we formally restate our substantive position, and affirm that we have in no way modified it and will continue strongly to demand it.
• Third, our disarmament plan contains explicit statement of our position in subpara (b) of “affirm” section of Preamble.⁴ Introduction of our plan in the UN will thus once more reaffirm our position.
• Fourth, we can make certain that in any public statement we make during the UN debate on disarmament we will forcefully and explicitly affirm the US position.

We know this presents a problem but we repeat on balance we think that the disadvantages of refusing the offer outweigh the advantages. We thought it would be useful for you to have these points spelled out before you when we talk Tuesday morning.

If you do agree to proceeding as recommended, we believe it will be important to background the press in order to put the Statement of Principles in perspective as a fairly limited step which should not be taken as indicating disarmament is just around the corner; it only means that an obstacle to resuming disarmament negotiations is cleared away. It does not mean that we can in any way relax our efforts to safeguard our rights in Berlin so long as these continue to be threatened.⁵

Stevenson

0. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 600.0012/9-1861. Secret; Niact. Passed to the White House.
1. The U.S.-Soviet bilateral talks on disarmament resumed in New York at USUN on September 6. Seven sessions were held (Nos. 19-25), the final one on September 19. Documentation on these talks is ibid., 600.0012 for September 1961. The Department’s instruction prior to these talks specified that U.S. “willingness to resume bilateral disarmament talks in New York will help maintain our posture of reasonableness. However, since the Soviets are now in a highly vulnerable propaganda position we should not make any undue or unnecessary concessions in order to achieve agreement on principles.” (Telegram 428 to USUN, September 2; ibid., 600.0012/9-261) See the Supplement.
2. The text as presented on September 14 has not been found, but it is apparently identical to the agreed text of September 20, with the exception noted in footnote 3 below. For the final text, see Documents on Disarmament, 1961, pp. 439-442. The memorandum of the McCloy-Zorin meeting held September 14, at which the U.S. draft was tabled, and telegram 794 from USUN, September 18, reporting Zorin’s acceptance of all but one sentence of the U.S. draft, are in Department of State, Central Files, 600.0012/9-2851 and 600.0012/9-1861, respectively. Both are in the Supplement.
3. The text of the sentence and an explanation of its significance to the United States is in a letter from McCloy to Zorin, September 20, printed in Documents on Disarmament, 1961, p. 442. Zorin’s reply, also dated September 20, and a statement by the Soviet Government on the bilateral talks are ibid., pp. 443-444 and 444-458, respectively.
4. The language on this point in the U.S. general and complete disarmament plan as released on September 25 is ibid., p. 476.
5. At 5:38 p.m. on September 19, Rusk called Bundy to discuss approval of this McCloy-Dean proposal. “B asked if the Sec were satisfied. The Sec said he is sure himself they can live with it but thinks it will take careful backgrounding—it is not a disarmament agreement or plan. It is a statement of principles upon which we are agreed, which will be taken fully into account in future negotiations.” (Memorandum of telephone conversation; Department of State, Rusk Files: Lot 72 D 192, Telephone Conversations)