Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XIII, Western Europe Region

142. Aide-Mémoire From the French Government to the U.S. Government¹

Paris, March 11, 1966.

AIDE-MÉMOIRE

For some years the Government of France has noted on numerous occasions, publicly as well as in conversations with allied governments, that it considered that the organization of the North Atlantic Treaty no longer responded, as far as it is concerned, to the conditions which prevail in the world at the present time and which are fundamentally different from those of 1949 and the following years.

Indeed, the threats weighing on the Western world, in particular in Europe, and which had motivated the conclusion of the treaty have changed in nature. They no longer present the immediate and menacing character that they presented formerly. Further, the countries of Europe have reestablished their economy and consequently have regained resources. In particular, France is equipped with an atomic armament the very nature of which excludes that it be integrated. In the third place, the nuclear equilibrium between the Soviet Union and the United States being substituted for the monopoly possessed by the latter, has transformed the general conditions of the defense of the West. Finally, it is a fact that Europe is no longer the center of international crisis. This (center) has moved elsewhere, especially to Asia, where the ensemble of the countries of the Atlantic Alliance is obviously not implicated.

This evolution does not in any manner lead the French Government to call into question the treaty signed at Washington April 4, 1949. In other words and except for events which, during the coming years, might come to modify in a fundamental way relations between the East and the West, it does not intend to avail itself in 1969 of the provisions of Article 13 of the treaty, and considers that the alliance must continue as long as it appears necessary.

This being affirmed without equivocation, the problem of the organization is posed, that is of all the agreements, arrangements and decisions taken after the signature of the treaty, whether multilateral or bilateral in form. The French Government considers that this organization no longer responds to that which appears to it to be indispensable.

Doubtless one could conceive that a negotiation would be undertaken to modify by common agreement the arrangements in force. The French Government would have been happy to propose it if it had had reason to think that it (the negotiation) could lead to the result which it (the French Government) has in view. Everything unhappily shows that such an undertaking would lead to failure, the partners of France seeming to be, or declaring themselves, all in favor of the maintenance of the status quo, if not of the reinforcement of everything which, from the French point of view, appears henceforth unacceptable.

Consequently, France is led to draw the consequences of the situation, that is, to take for itself the measures which seem to it to be indispensable and which are in no way incompatible with its participation in the alliance nor with its participation, if such should be the case, in military operations at the sides of its allies.

Already, in the past, the French Government has taken some measures of this nature for its naval forces attached to NATO both in the Mediterranean and in the Atlantic. It is now a question of its land and air forces stationed in Germany and which are assigned to the allied command in Europe. France proposes to put an end to such assignment. This decision will lead to its simultaneous withdrawal from the two integrated commands its forces are attached to, and in which it participates in the framework of NATO, that is, the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe and the Central European Command, and, for the same reason, the transfer, outside of French territory, of the seats of these two headquarters.

The application of the ensemble of these measures obviously raises numerous problems, which the Government of France is ready as of now to discuss with its allies and in particular with the United States of America. There will be reason to examine the liaison which would be established between the French command and NATO command, as well as to determine the conditions in which the French forces, particularly in Germany, would participate in time of war, if Article 5 of the Treaty of Washington was called into play, in military actions in common, both with respect to the command as well as with respect to the operations themselves. This supposes in particular that the French land and air forces presently stationed in Germany will be maintained there under the conventions of 23 October 1954, which the Government of France is for its part disposed to do. Further, there will be reason to consider the problems which might be posed for France with respect to the Military Committee and the Standing Group, including the liaison to be established, if necessary, between these organisms and the French command.

Such are, in broad outline, the actions the Government of France envisages, as far as it is concerned, in order to adapt the modalities of its participation in the Atlantic Alliance to the new conditions. It is ready to engage in discussions on the practical conditions for the application of these measures and hopes that adequate arrangements can be brought about by common agreement among all of the allies.

The multilateral problems are not however the only ones posed for the United States and France. The two countries have indeed concluded in the past a series of bilateral accords still in force, which are the following:

• Depots of Déols-La Martineries
• The placing at the disposition of American forces of certain airfields and installations in France
• Line of Communications
• American Headquarters at St. Germain
• Pipeline.

The Government of France considers that these accords in their entirety no longer respond to present conditions, which lead it to recover on French territory the complete exercise of its sovereignty, in other words to no longer accept that foreign units, installations or bases in France are under the command in any manner of authorities other than French. It is ready to study and, possibly, to arrange with the Government of the United States the practical consequences which flow therefrom.

The Government of France is prepared, further, to engage in a discussion on the military facilities which could be placed at the disposition of the Government of the United States on French territory in the event of a conflict in which one or the other countries would participate by virtue of the Atlantic Alliance. These facilities could be made the object of an agreement to be concluded between the two governments.²

1. Source: Department of State, Bohlen Files: Lot 74 D 379, NATO Documents. No classification marking. For a similar translation, which also indicates how this aide-memoire differs from the ones sent to the other NATO governments, see American Foreign Policy: Current Documents, 1966, pp. 318–321.
2. On March 25, the United States transmitted a 3-page response stating that it would await clarification of the French position on these agreements. For its text, see ibid., p. 324. On March 29, the French Government transmitted memoranda to the United States and the other 13 NATO allies detailing the steps France intended to take to remove itself from the NATO military structure. For texts of these memoranda, see ibid., pp. 324–326.