320. Memorandum of the Meeting of the OCB Working Group on Austria0
MEMBERS PRESENT
- State—Mr. Wells Stabler, Chairman
- Defense—Col. A.P. Sauer
- CIA—Representative present
- ICA—Representative absent
- USIA—Mr. Max Grossman
- Treasury—Mr. James A. Griffin
- OCB Staff—Mr. Oscar Holder, Staff Representative
ALSO PRESENT
- State—Ambassador H. Freeman Matthews
- Budget—Mr. George Vaishvila
- Labor—Mr. Saul Moskowitz
- OCB Staff—Mr. Bromley Smith, OCB Executive Officer (for Ambassador’s briefing only), Mr. Ridgway B. Knight, OCB Deputy Executive Officer (for Ambassador’s briefing only), Miss Mabel Moses, Secretary
The OCB Working Group on Austria met on October 26, 1959 with Ambassador Matthews, who gave the working group the benefit of his impressions on matters of current interest in Austria, and their development up to this point.
He said Austria is exceedingly well disposed toward the United States but is now also disposed to be forgetful of the occupation period and of the 9-year postwar struggle against Soviet opposition to achieve a Treaty; Austria is now more nearly straddling the East-West division and is beginning to develop a greater sense of neutralism, not only in the military sense, but also from the point of view of psychological, political and economic interests.
The Austrians tend to exaggerate their possible influence in their ambition to play the role of a “bridge” between East and West. They adduce geographical and political reasons from their long imperial experience to justify such a role. They appear to be rather naive on this subject, particularly Chancellor Raab. The danger of this point of view is that they could get involved in the middle of some problems in a fashion to cause embarrassment and difficulty to the West.
Another difficulty in the neutrality idea of the Austrians is that, when they come to a vote in the UN or are called upon to decide one way or another on a problem, they show a growing tendency to abstain, except in cases where they have an aroused strong general public opinion and sympathy towards a problem. The Tibet issue is one in which the Austrians registered their vote favorably to us.
The Austrians tend to look more and more to the other European neutrals, Switzerland and Sweden, as models. Foreign Minister Kreisky himself is married to a Swede, and it might be expected that his thinking would be influenced accordingly.
If it became necessary to suggest a neutral nation sympathetic to the West as a compromise candidate between Turkey and Yugoslavia for the UN Security Council, Austria might not be the ideal candidate. Austria has an extensive record of abstention ism in problems coming before the UN. However, Austrian ties still are very much with the West, and [Page 816] Austrian thinking is sympathetic in that direction; Austria is not becoming a Soviet satellite.
Replying to a Defense query, the Ambassador stated that it is quite possible that, if the Austrians could not acquire equipment they needed from the West by way of purchasing it on favorable terms and if the East offered the Austrians the same equipment on more favorable terms, the Austrians might acquire it from the East in this case. The Ambassador also stated that at present the purchase of defense equipment in large quantities is not an issue since Austria just now is getting and still continues to get our equipment, so that the urgent need does not exist now. It is quite possible, however, he added, that Austria would be easily tempted, if they are not provided equipment on their terms, to turn to the East for them.
On the psychological issue, the Ambassador stated that the first Russian Sputnik had made a tremendous impression on the Austrians,1 although whether the Austrians believe the Russians are superior to us in “space” is somewhat doubtful. They want us to be superior and still have the feeling that we are. The impact of the Russian advance in space has been less in Austria than in the rest of Europe. Still the Austrians do not discredit the fact that the Soviet Union is quite powerful in this field.
The Defense member of the Working Group referred to the Ambassador’s concern expressed previously to the Deputy Secretary of Defense regarding the limited nature of Defense Minister Graf’s itinerary in the United States and said that the itinerary reflected the Minister’s wishes to visit reserve units, Civil Defense operations, etc. He had specifically stated he did not want to see major Air Force operations, such as SAC. The Ambassador thought this most unfortunate; he did not know whether anything could be done on that score at this late date but did feel that Minister Graf should be exposed to U.S. military power. This would make a stronger and far more valuable impression on Minister Graf than he could obtain from visits to universities, etc. The Chairman of the Working Group undertook to look further into this problem with Defense.2
Following the Ambassador’s departure, there was a discussion by the working group of the comments submitted by the Embassy in Vienna on the report.3 The working group agreed with these comments. In addition, certain changes were discussed in the Defense portion of the semi-final draft of the report, as well as a JCS comment registered [Page 817] through the Defense representative concerning evaluation of U.S. operations as contained in the draft.
The working group then agreed to issue the report as a final document for distribution to and further review by the Board Assistants at their formal meeting on November 13, 1959.
OCB Staff Representative
- Source: Department of State, OCB Files: Lot 61 D 385, Austria. Secret. The meeting was held in the Executive Office Building.↩
- The first Soviet Sputnik was launched on October 4, 1957.↩
- As of November 3, the latest information from Defense is that this resulted in the Minister’s visit to the carrier U.S.S. Independence, and the Army portion of his visit now includes the latest U.S. tactical methods of deployment. [Footnote in the source text.]↩
- Presumably reference is to Document 322.↩