Office of the Historian

141. Memorandum of Action1

Washington, September 5, 1961.

CURRENT UNITED NATIONS MATTERS

PARTICIPANTS

  • The President
  • The Secretary of State
  • Ambassador Adlai Stevenson
  • White House Staff: McGeorge Bundy, Theodore Sorensen, Arthur Schlesinger
  • Assistant Secretary Harlan Cleveland

[Here follows item 1 concerning the President’s address to the United Nations.]

2. Re Berlin:

a.
The President asked the State Department to consider the following elements of an eventual negotiation on Berlin, and to consider also the extent to which such elements might be included in public statements prior to or during the General Assembly:
(i)
a proposal to take to the International Court of Justice the legal status of Western access rights to West Berlin and abide by the results of Court action;
(ii)
a plebiscite, handled by the UN, in West Berlin;
(iii)
a move of some UN functions, or the whole Headquarters of the UN, to West Berlin, with appropriate guarantees to make West Berlin really a Free City, make the Autobahn an international highway, etc. (The Secretary of State and Ambassador Stevenson both demurred on this proposal.);
(iv)
a limitation or prohibition of nuclear arms in either part of Germany;
(v)
a limitation of the number of domestic and foreign troops in West and East Germany; and
(vi)
a non-aggression pact between the NATO and the Warsaw pact countries.
b.
The President asked the Department to consider whether he should make a statement, prior to the visits of the Presidents of Indonesia and Mali next week, emphasizing the willingness of the United States to negotiate about Berlin. Such a statement could be made at a special ad hoc press conference. The possibility was mentioned that the President might announce on this occasion that he intends to go to New York to address the General Assembly.

[Here follow items 3-5 on unrelated U.N. matters.]

  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 762.00/9-561. Top Secret. Drafted by Cleveland. Attached to a memorandum from Cleveland to Kohler, also dated September 5.↩