NATO—SECRET 1 y ' (i- ORGANISATION DU TRAITE DE L'ATLANTIQUE NORD | NORTH ATLANTIC TRE A TY ORGANISATION PLACE MAfi&HAl DE IATÏŒ DE TASSfiNY • PARIS (XVI*) • ÏÉL O L 50-20 £ ■ NATO SECRET CUREAU O U REPRÉ SENTANT OFFICE OF THE STANDING G ROUP DU GROUPE PERMANENT REPRESENTATIVE 30 April 1963 MEMORANDUM FOR : Secretary , Standing Group SUBJECT Special Report by Secretary Gene ral on NATO Defense Policy. Background 1. During t he past three weeks the Secretary General has held discussions with individual delegations, SACEUR, and the Standing Group on the text of the report on defense policy he proposes to submit to the Ministers at Ottawa. This report is Part II of the Secretary General’s Annual Political Appraisal. Part I, not yet circulated, will cover developments * of general interest since the Ministers meeting in December, whereas Part II, 1T on NATO Defense Policy, will deal primarily with the Secretary General's views as to the organization and establishment of the Inter~Allied Nuclear Force envisioned in paragraph 6 of the Nassau Accord. 2. Although it is clearly understood by all con cerned that the Secretary General's Report represents his personal views, and not an agreed Council position, the Secretary General has sought through the above informal bilateral discussions, to develop views which will be as acceptable as possible to the members of the Alliance. It is currently envisioned by the Secretary General and the majority of the Council, that the Secretary General's Report on NATO Defense Policy will constitute the basis for a decision by the governments at Ottawa as to whether or not to create an Inter-Allied Nuclear Force along the lines proposed in his report. __________________ is Co.-itroi N° .y.. Current Situation 3. At the Council meeting of 30 April, which was attended by the Standing Group Principals and the Chairman of the M C/PS, the Secretary General reported to the Council on the progress that he had made in discussing the text of his report with SACEUR and with the Standing Group during the past three days. Additionally, he advised the delegations of certain changes that he proposed to make to his preliminary dr ait in light of these discussions, and of discussions with individual Ambassadors. DECLASSIFIED - PUBLICLY DISCLOSED - PDN(2015)0004 - DECLASSIFIE - MISE EN LECTURE PUBLIQUE LECTURE EN - MISE - DECLASSIFIE - PDN(2015)0004 DISCLOSED - PUBLICLY DECLASSIFIED 4. Attached is the latest draft of the report available to SGREP. It incorporates the changes which the Secretary General proposes to make as a result of his discussions with SACEUR and the SGN referred to above. It does not (repeat not) incorporate as yet certain additional changes which the Secretary General advised the Council he intended to make in light of discussions with the various Am bassadors. These latter were outlined in broad terms at the Council meeting by the Secretary General, but no text has as yet been circulated. SGREP will report thesé changes as soon as they are available. IND, SCAN NATO-SECRET Section IMS NATO-SECRET - Z - NATO SECRET April 30 Council Meeting. 5. At the Council meeting of 30 April, the Secretary General, in addition to advising the C ouncil of the various changes referred to in para 4 above, stated that the Standing Group had advised him that "Although the estab­ lishment of the Inter-Allied Nuclear F orce, of itself, will not solve SACEUR's problem of force modernization, the effective operation of an Inter-Allied Nuclear Force is both feasible and desirable from a military point of v iew ." This statement was confirmed by the Chairman of the Standing Group, who also emphasized that it addressed itself to the draft the Standing Croup had discussed with him and that there were additional comments made on specific portions of the paper which the Secretary General had taken into account in his latest text. (Text enclosed). 6. The French Representative made a statement reserving his overall position on the substance of the Report. He indicated that in his view there remained certain fundamental issues to be clarified by the Council on the subject and that the draft Report, while recognized as only a personal submission by the Secretary General, tended to gather sem i-official, or official, status in light of it3 discussion in the Council and with Military Authorities. It was agreed that the basic issues involved would be discussed by the Council on F riday, 3 May. 7. In view of the fact that until now the evolution of the Secretary General's Report has been handled largely on an informal, and bilateral, basis as between the Secretary General and those he wished to consult, this LOM attempts to summarise the situation and furnish addressees the basic background paper. Changes thereon will hereafter be reported by SGREP in the normal manner, using the Enclosure to this LOM as a basis reference. Lieutenant General STANDING GROUP REPRESENTATIVE Enclosure: Draft Special Rpt by SecGen on NATC Defense Policy dtd Z9 Apr. DECLASSIFIED - PUBLICLY DISCLOSED - PDN(2015)0004 - DÉCLASSIFIÉ - MISE EN LECTURE PUBLIQUE LECTURE EN - MISE - DÉCLASSIFIÉ - PDN(2015)0004 DISCLOSED - PUBLICLY DECLASSIFIED cc: SAC EUR (w/encl) SAC LAN? (w/encl) CINCHAN (w/encl) NATO SECRET C OMMAIRCHAN (w/encl) NATO-SECRET NATO-SECRET NATO SECRET DRAFT 2.9th April I963 SPECIAL REPORT BY THE SECRETARY GENERAL ON NATO DEFENCE POLICY Following the example of our meeting in Athens of last year when Defence Ministers also attended, I have thought it appropriate to deal with the major problems of NATO defence policy in a Special Report. 2. Developments in the six months between the Athens meeting and the Ministerial meeting in December were summarised in the Acting Secretary General's Progress Report on NATO Defence Policy, C-M(62)l49 of 4th December, It would serve no useful purpose to review these again, except perhaps to recall that the latter part of 1962 was a period of investigation and self­ education in nuclear problems rather than one which saw the emergence of firm conclusions or decisions. The December Ministerial meeting and the proposals formulated shortly afterwards by the President of the United States and the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom in the Nassau Communiqué gave a new direction to the Council's discussion. 3. At the December meeting attention was focused on NATO strategy and the associated problems of the role of conventional forces and of the capacity of the Alliance to meet the goals recommended by the NATO Military Authorities. The discussion of this issue gave rise to a number of important statements and suggestions for further action on the part of Ministers. At Nassau the two member countries concerned put forward new concepts of potentially far-reaching significance for the organisation of NATO's nuclear defence and the future pattern of nuclear co-operation within the Alliance. 4. I had envisaged that in the New Year the Council might work out a programme for-following up these two issues simultaneously, though separately. In January* it seemed possible that by pursuing the possibilities of setting up a NATO Nuclear Force and by making concurrently a sober examination of 'the prospects of meeting MC 26/4 goals for conventional forces, the results of these two exercises might be made to converge in time and provide the Council with a firm basis for determining future NATO strategy. The Council would then have been able to give guidance to the NATO military authorities on various outstanding questions, including MRBMs, and help to clear away some of the obscurities which complicate the formulation of long term NATO force requirements and the establishment of force goals together with individual DECLASSIFIED - PUBLICLY DISCLOSED - PDN(2015)0004 - DÉCLASSIFIÉ - MISE EN LECTURE PUBLIQUE LECTURE EN - MISE - DÉCLASSIFIÉ - PDN(2015)0004 DISCLOSED - PUBLICLY DECLASSIFIED country force contribution to these goals. NATO-SECRET NATO SECRET NATO-SECRET NATO SECRET - 2 - 5. A satisfactory method of following up the conventional forces question has yet to be found. I am tentatively drafting some suggestions which, together with any other ideas which may be put forward, could at an appropriate time be discussed with Permanent Representatives. I hope concrete proposals can be worked out after Ottawa. We must certainly not lose sight of the urgency of this ma tter. It affects the future of our long term force planning (including any changes to be brought about in the Triennial Review and the future infrastructure programme), the allocation of the resources available for defence, and the balance between conventional and nuclear forces. 6. In the meanwhile the Council has concentrated its full attention on the Nassau proposals. The latter have made an important contribution to thinking on one of the basic questions which has preoccupied not only the Council but public opinion in member countries during the last two years and which was the leitmotiv of the Council discussions leading to the conclusions reached at the Athena maeting - that is how to secure a wider sharing of responsibility in decisions for the possible use of nuclear weapons in NATO defence and how to provide for a closer association by individual member countries in nuclear policy and planning. 7. After hearing explanatory statements from the United States and United Kingdom delegations on January 11th, the Council agreed that the two distinct though complementary concepts, reflected in the Nassau Communiqué, the "Inter-Allied Nuclear Force" and the "Multilateral Force" should be studied in parallel. Valuable background to these studies has been provided in the interval by the Governments concerned. In particular Permanent Representatives were grateful to receive a very full briefing on the develop­ ment of the United States nuclear weapons and delivery systems, which was given to the NATO Nuclear Committee under the CABAL procedures by an expert team on February 12-13th.