238. Memorandum of Conference With President Eisenhower0
OTHERS PRESENT
- Secretary Herter, Secretary Dillon, Ambassador Wadsworth, Mr. Farley, General Twining, Secretary Gates, General Loper, Mr. McCone, General Cabell, Dr. Fisk, Mr. Black, Mr. Gordon Gray, Dr. Kistiakowsky, General Goodpaster
Secretary Herter said the group had come down to take up with the President the questions as to the next steps in our suspension of testing and our negotiations for an agreement with the Russians on suspension of testing.1 He said that the technical discussions at which Dr. Fisk headed the U.S. delegation had not been successful and that the Soviet scientific delegation had released publicly a statement impugning the integrity of our technical negotiators, and insulting their scientific competence.2 Dr. Fisk reported on the Geneva meetings and said the Soviets had refused to give serious consideration to anything relating to criteria for inspection. On this matter they and the U.S. delegation were miles apart. On the question of improvements in the inspection system, the Russians were most agreeable. If we were to be guided by their criteria, we would omit most underground events, including all the underground tests the U.S. has conducted. He described the Soviet statement as a severe challenge to the integrity of the U.S. team.
Mr. Herter thought that we should take very seriously the Soviet action impugning the integrity of our scientists. Mr. McCone read examples of the Soviet statements.
The President said he thought the State Department should protest this, indicating that if this is the way factual data is to be treated and talked about, the effect is to throw doubt on the whole process of negotiations. He thought it should be brought out that our people were not instructed, but were asked to bring the best scientific judgment to bear on this problem.
The President asked what was thought to be the reason for the Soviet action, specifically whether it is simply that they are opposed to an elaborate and effective system. Dr. Fisk said that they probably are. He added that the Soviet scientists may be engaged in a face-saving operation, to try to prove that the scientific conclusions reached in mid-1958 are valid. Our scientists recognize that those findings were erroneous.
Ambassador Wadsworth said that the Soviets very much want to achieve an agreement. They are simply objecting to considering this data before the system goes into effect. They have said that they would be willing to “talk about” the data after a treaty is signed. Mr. McCone said he felt they did not want to open up their country to inspection. The President asked why it was thought they would not then accept a ban limited to prohibiting atmospheric tests. Mr. Herter thought that such a ban may [Page 818] be all it is possible to obtain—or perhaps a ban based on the “threshold” concept.3
The President said that when Ambassador Wadsworth returns to Geneva he should excoriate the Russians for their statement regarding our scientists. Mr. Herter suggested this might be incorporated in the statement he was proposing to the President regarding the continuation of the suspension of testing.
The President thought it might be best not to make any statement at the present time. There are two essential points involved, the first being the evaluation of the scientific basis for an inspection system prepared in 1958, and the second, the charges that have been made against our scientists’ integrity. After further discussion he said he thought that a comprehensive but succinct statement should be made. Mr. Herter asked if that should be prepared as a letter from the President to Khrushchev. The President thought that would be of little value, since Khrushchev would simply answer with a long tirade. He preferred a public statement. In short, we should say that we will not test in the atmosphere, but that, because of the Soviet political decision regarding a system of underground inspection, it seems rather hopeless to try to go beyond an atmospheric ban. Mr. Herter again suggested that the ban might be extended to some threshold insofar as underground explosions are concerned. The President thought the threshold should be put relatively high. Mr. McCone pointed out that in that case there would be few inspections.
The President said he is rather amazed that the Soviets have used this tactic—of impugning our scientific data. General Cabell said the Soviets have been playing this disagreement in a very low key at home, stating there are some differences but that a very large area of agreement has been achieved.
At this point Mr. Herter showed the President a draft of a proposed release on this subject. The President made a few revisions to strengthen [Page 819] the statement, and approved it with these revisions. (Mr. Hagerty released it later in the morning.)4
The President asked whether we should not now bring forward a specific proposal at Geneva, recognizing that the Soviets may reject it since they apparently are pressing for “all or nothing.” Mr. Herter said that, regarding the threshold approach, we are trying to see whether we can set a level of seismic signal which can be incorporated into our instructions to Wadsworth. The President said that if the Soviets want to consider the problem seriously, this would be quite agreeable to us. If they do not, then we should propose 1) the threshold concept, or 2) an atmospheric ban as a less desirable alternative. We should still put a few inspection stations into Russia. Our real aim is to open that country up to some degree. Mr. Herter said it is also to create a model for disarmament agreements.
The President commented with respect to disarmament agreements that he believes it will be necessary to leave atomic weapons to the last. We can identify and cut down conventional arms and means of delivery. If we cut back our armaments to where only a retaliatory force is left, war becomes completely futile. He thought we should therefore go into inspection and reduction of conventional arms and visible means of delivery of atomic weapons. Mr. Herter said Admiral Strauss had thought there would be advantage to the U.S. in cutting off production of atomic material. It now appears that the “requirements” stated by our military authorities for atomic weapons will not permit this. The President said he is completely unconvinced as to the validity of these so-called requirements.
[Here follows discussion of unrelated subjects.]
Brigadier General, USA
- Source: Eisenhower Library, Whitman File, Eisenhower Diaries. Secret. Drafted by Goodpaster on December 31. For Kistiakowsky’s account of this meeting, see A Scientist at the White House, pp. 213–214.↩
- The principals met on December 28 to discuss the issues that would be raised with the President. Accounts of that meeting are ibid., p. 212, and in a memorandum of conversation by Spiers, December 28, in Department of State, Secretary’s Memoranda of Conversation: Lot 64 D 199. See the Supplement.↩
- See Annex II to the Report of Working Group II to the Geneva Conference on the Discontinuance of Nuclear Weapon Tests: December 18, 1959, printed in Documents on Disarmament, 1945–1959, pp .1561–1571.↩
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The “threshold” concept was discussed more fully at the December 28 meeting. Herter presented it as a third and better alternative to either giving up any attempt to control underground testing or accepting less than adequate detection and control. As Fisk explained, the threshold concept (above which underground tests would be banned) could be expressed in terms of seismic magnitude rather than kiloton yield. While there was a difference of view between the Soviet Union and the United States on the correlation between yield of explosion and seismic amplitude, there appeared to be general agreement among seismologists on the relationship between signal amplitude and seismic intensity.
Kistiakowsky describes an earlier meeting on December 28 among himself, Herter, Dillon, Farley, and Gerard Smith from 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. At this meeting, according to Kistiakowsky, he introduced the threshold plan as it evolved in his thinking and in discussions with McCone. Kistiakowsky observed that the concept could solve the problems of decoupling and the Latter hole, that tests below the threshold could be announced in advance, and that with improvements in seismic detection methods the threshold could be gradually reduced. (A Scientist at the White House, p. 211)
↩ - For text, see Documents on Disarmament, 1945–1959, pp. 1590–1591.↩