500.A/2–647: Telegram
The United States Representative at the United Nations (Austin) to the Secretary of State
urgent
118. Following is a short summary of the meeting of the subcommittee of the SC on the regulation of armaments. I am sending in a separate telegram a working paper1 which will be taken up at another meeting of the subcommittee Friday at 3 p.m.
The subcommittee reached no decision after six hours of discussion. It now appears unlikely that complete agreement will be reached. The last hour of the meeting was spent in attempting to frame alternative resolutions which could be submitted to the SC indicating the exact areas of agreement and disagreement, so as to frame the issues for the Council.
The only real issue remaining is whether the resolution should contain provisions which would make it amply clear that the new commission shall not in any way infringe on the jurisdiction of the AEC. Gromyko continued his obstinate refusal to include such provisions in any resolution. The stated grounds for his refusal continued to be that the GA resolution in paragraph 8 was an authoritative decision on this question which amply protected the AEC. Any further protection was unnecessary and, in fact, reflected on the GA. He also stated that the Council could not add to or subtract from the GA’s decision. The members of the subcommittee, I feel sure, are now all satisfied that some such provisions are essential and the only question is as to the exact formulation of the provisions.
We continued to press for the provisions contained in the working paper submitted to the committee this morning. These provisions were somewhat modified and now appear in the Australian proposal paragraph 3 (see separate telegram). The Colombian alternative was put forward in the hope of a compromise. Gromyko stated it was much preferable to the Australian proposal but avoided committing himself to it during the meeting and finally made it quite clear that he could accept no statement in the resolution which excluded from the new [Page 400] commission matters which fell within the terms of reference of the AEC. In spite of this there continued to be some pressure for further discussions in an effort to find a solution. We made it clear that our position was based on principle, that if there was agreement that there should be no encroachment by the new commission on the jurisdiction of the AEC, we would be glad to search for language to put this in effect. We made it quite clear we doubted that there was such an agreement.
- Telegram 119 from New York, February 6, not printed, transmitted the text of the subcommittee working paper which was in the form of the four-paragraph draft resolution subsequently recommended by the subcommittee. For the text of the latter, see United Nations, Official Records of the General Assembly, Second Session, Supplement No. 2, Report of the Security Council to the General Assembly, p. 71 (hereafter cited as GA (II), Suppl. No. 2). The working paper draft was substantially the same as the subcommittee’s ultimate recommendation as to paragraphs 1, 2, and 4. Its paragraph 3 consisted of Colombian and Australian texts from which evolved final subcommittee alternative texts for that paragraph. (501.BC/2–647)↩