Non-Proliferation and the Dynamics of the Middle Cold War: The Superpowers, the MLF, and the NPT

Abstract

During the 1960s, the United States and the Soviet Union contended both with one another and with the members of their respective alliances in attempting to deal with the issues raised by nuclear proliferation. These negotiations, which covered a number of matters but centred on the conflict between a non-proliferation agreement and NATO plans for nuclear sharing, illustrate in microcosm some of the most important geopolitical trends of the middle Cold War. This episode was in certain diplomatic and conceptual respects an important precursor to détente. It also illuminated the declining ability of the United States and the Soviet Union to manage their respective European alliances, as well as the degree to which Russo-American cooperation further strained these partnerships. Finally, the negotiations and their aftermath showed that, in geostrategic terms, Moscow and Washington had much in common during the 1960s.

Notes

  [1] Pravda, 2 July 1968, in Current Digest of the Soviet Press (CDSP) XX, 27: 3.

  [2] Accordingly, this essay focuses mainly on US–Soviet and intra-alliance diplomacy, and does not delve as deeply into the intricacies of the debates in the Eighteen-Nation Disarmament Conference (ENDC). On this subject, see Shaker's exhaustive study, The Non-Proliferation Treaty. On the safeguards issue, which accounted for the delay between the resolution of the nuclear sharing/non-proliferation debate and the signing of the treaty, see Forland, “Negotiating Supranational Rules.”

  [3] There is no single account that provides detailed analysis of the whole of US non-proliferation policy during the 1960s. For coverage of various aspects of the US stance, consult Gavin, “Blasts from the Past”; Quester, The Politics of Nuclear Proliferation; Bunn, Arms Control by Committee, 58–81; Schwartz, Lyndon Johnson and Europe, 39–63; and Seaborg, Stemming the Tide. Earlier studies and theoretical perspectives include Roberts, The Nuclear Years, 68–78; Blacker and Duffy, International Arms Control; Carnesale and Haass, Superpower Arms Control; and Jensen, Return from the Nuclear Brink. There is also Maddock, “The Nth Country Conundrum,” a detailed but overly critical study of American policy.

On NATO politics and strategy, see Haftendorn, NATO and the Nuclear Revolution, 111–75; and Heuser, NATO, Britain, France, and the FRG.

  [4] Most recently, there is Schwartz, Lyndon Johnson and Europe, 39–63. See also Costigliola, “Lyndon B. Johnson, Germany, and the ‘End of the Cold War’”; Kaplan, “The U.S. and NATO in the Johnson Years”; Haftendorn, NATO and the Nuclear Revolution, 111–42; Heuser, NATO, Britain, France, and the FRG, esp. 125–42; Schwartz, NATO's Nuclear Dilemmas, 82–135; and Trachtenberg, A Constructed Peace, 312–15, 363–8, 380–81.

  [5] Selvage, “The Warsaw Pact and Nuclear Non-Proliferation,” uses Soviet–Warsaw Pact negotiations from 1963 to 1965 to illustrate internal alliance dynamics. In Russian, there is Timerbaev, Rossiya I yadernoye nerasprostraneniye, 1945–1968, 209–320. Older studies, conducted without the benefit of declassified documents and often dealing with the NPT only in passing, include Sodaro, Moscow, Germany and the West from Khrushchev to Gorbachev; Anderson, Public Politics in an Authoritarian State; Wolfe , Soviet Power and Europe, 1945–1970; Hermann, Perceptions and Behavior in Soviet Foreign Policy; Edmonds, Soviet Foreign Policy, 1962–1973; and von Beyme, The Soviet Union in World Politics.

  [6] The Eisenhower administration had occasionally wrestled with the issue, but due to a lack of urgency and presidential involvement, did not formulate a coherent strategy. Maddock, “The Fourth Country Problem.”

  [7] Memorandum of a Meeting with the President, 30 July 1962, FRUS 1961 –1963, VII: 520–21.

  [8] National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) 1–61, 17 January 1961, FRUS 1961–1963, VIII: 8.

  [9] NIE 4–63, 28 June 1963, Box 1, National Intelligence Estimates File, National Security File (NSF), Lyndon Baines Johnson Presidential Library (LBJL).

 [10] NIE 4–63, 28 June 1963, Box 1, NIEs, NSF, LBJL; and Rostow to Rusk, 17 September 1963, FRUS 1961–1963, VIII: 507–11.

 [11] Position Paper for Meeting with Soviet chairman Nikita Khrushchev, 26 May 1961, Box 126, President's Office Files, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library (JFKL).

 [12] Khrushchev's aspirations are detailed in Taubman, Khrushchev, esp. 348–55; Khrushchev, Khrushchev Remembers, 47–54; and Gaddis, We Now Know, 238–9.

 [13] Fursenko and Naftali, One Hell of a Gamble, esp. 170–71, 182–3; and Harrison, Driving the Soviets up the Wall, 116.

 [14] Memorandum for the Secretary of Defense, 26 June 1961, Box 410, Robert Komer Series, NSF, JFKL.

 [15] Editorial Note, FRUS 1961–1963, XXII: 339–40.

 [16] Khrushchev, Krushchev Remembers, 255–7; and Gromyko, Memoirs, 251–2.

 [17] Conversation between Khrushchev and Ion Gheorge Maurer, 27 September 1964, in Cold War International History Project (CWIHP) Bulletin, 14 (Winter 2003), 450.

 [18] Pravda, 29 July 1963, reprinted in CDSP XV, 30: 5; also Izvestia, 22 August 1963, in CDSP XV, 34: 11. The broader context of the Sino-Soviet split, including the role of nuclear issues, is explored is Pleshakov, “Nikita Khrushchev and Sino-Soviet Relations”; Kayle, “Soviet Advisers in China in the 1950s”; Chen Jian and Kang Kuisong, “Chinese Politics and the Collapse of the Sino-Soviet Alliance”; and Chen Jian, Mao's China and the Cold War, 53–84. On earlier Soviet aid to the Chinese program, see Timerbaev, Rossiya I yadernoye nerasprostraneniye, esp. 127–34.

 [19] NIE 23–62, 25 July 1962, Box 5, NIEs, NSF, LBJL. The best study of West German nuclear policy is Kuntzel, Bonn and the Bomb.

 [20] Trachtenberg, Constructed Peace, chapters 6–9.

 [21] Dobrynin, In Confidence, 147.

 [22] Trachtenberg, Constructed Peace, 252–6. Trachtenberg speculates that these fears prompted Khrushchev to launch the Berlin crises of 1958–61.

 [23] Discussion between Kuznetsov and the East German (SED) Politburo, 14 October 1963, Nuclear Non-Proliferation Collection, Cold War International History Project Virtual Archive. See also Office of Current Intelligence (OCI) Memorandum, 9 August 1963, Country File, NSF, JFKL.

 [24] Meetings between Ulbricht and Khrushchev, 4 July 1959, Germany in the Cold War Collection, CWIHP; “Rough Notes from a Conversation (Gromyko, Khrushchev, and Gomulka on the International Situation),” n.d. (October 1961), ibid.; and “Notes on the Discussions between Khrushchev and Ulbricht in Moscow,” 26 February 1962, ibid.

 [25] Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) Memorandum for the Secretary of Defense, 26 June 1961, Box 410, Robert Komer Series, NSF, JFKL; Bundy to Kennedy, 8 November 1962, Box 257, Departments and Agencies File, ibid.; Chang, “JFK, China, and the Bomb”; and Burr and Richelson, “Whether to ‘St> the Baby in the Cradle’.”

 [26] Memorandum of Conversation between Bundy and Dobrynin, 25 September 1964, Box 227, Country File, NSF, LBJL; and Entretien entre M. Alphand et M. Dobrynine (Interview between Alphand and Dobrynin), 8 October 1964, in DDF, II: 324. All translations from French are my own.

 [27] Report on the Sixth Political Consultative Committee (PCC) Meeting by First Secretary of the Hungarian Workers Party (MDP) to the Hungarian Politburo, 26 July 1963, Party Leaders Collection, Parallel History Project on NATO and the Warsaw Pact Archive (PHP); also Negotiations between the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Delegations, 20 September 1960, Sino-Soviet Relations Collection, CWIHP; and Stenogram of Meeting of the Delegations of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Chinese Communist Party, 8 July 1963, ibid.

 [28] Report by First Secretary János Kádár to the Hungarian Politburo, 26 July 1963, Party Leaders Collection, PHP.

 [29] By late 1964 Moscow's refusal to sanction military action against the PRC convinced the Johnson administration that there was little it could do to forestall a Chinese bomb. Memorandum of Conversation, 25 September 1964, Box 227, Country File, NSF, LBJL; Briefing by Defense Secretary McNamara to the Committee on Nuclear Proliferation, 7 January 1965, Box 10, Roswell Gilpatric Papers, JFKL.

 [30] Editorial Note, FRUS 1961–1963, V: 478–9; Ball, The Past Has Another Pattern, 260–62; Steinbrunner, A Cybernetic Theory of Decision; Trachtenberg, Constructed Peace, chapters 6–9.

 [31] Khrushchev to Kennedy, undated (mid-April 1963), FRUS 1961–1963, VI: 274.

 [32] Memoranda of Conversations, 25 July and 8 August 1962, FRUS 1961–1963, VII: 496, 541–7.

 [33] For instance, the Summary Record of NSC Executive Committee Meeting, 12 February 1963, Box 316, Meetings and Memoranda, NSF, JFKL.

 [34] Khrushchev to Kennedy, undated (mid-April 1963), FRUS 1961–1963, VI: 275.

 [35] For instance, Pravda, 10 April 1963, in CDSP XV, 15: 26; and Pravda, 29 May 1963 in ibid., 22: 20.

 [36] David Klein to Bundy, 3 June 1963, Box 218, Regional Security File, NSF, JFKL.

 [37] Memorandum of Conversation, 17 May 1963, FRUS 1961–1963, V: 675.

 [38] Meeting with the President on the Multilateral Force, 24 April 1963, Box 318, Meetings and Memoranda, NSF, JFKL.

 [39] Meeting with the President on the Multilateral Force, 4 May 1963, Box 217A, Regional Security File, NSF, JFKL; and Rusk to Kennedy, 6 June 1963, Box 218, Regional Security File, NSF, JFKL. It is important to note that, within the Kennedy administration, there were two sources of support for the MLF. The first was a group of MLF ‘theologians’, led by George Ball and Walt Rostow, who thought nuclear sharing desirable as a means of strengthening the Atlantic community. For Bundy and Kennedy, however, the allure of the MLF was that it was merely the least unattractive means of keeping the FRG non-nuclear. See Memoranda of Conversations in the President's Office, 18 and 23 February 1963, Box 217, Regional Security File, NSF, JFKL; and Bundy to Kennedy, 15 June 1963, Box 218, ibid.

 [40] “Audience accordée par le general de Gaulle à l'Ambassadeur de Grande-Bretagne” (Audience accorded by General de Gaulle to the British ambassador), 2 January 1963, DDF 1963, I: 5. On the politics and strategy of French nuclear policy, see Gordon, A Certain Idea of France, 3–78; and Keating, Constructing the Gaullist Consensus, 21–32, 139–63.

 [41] Meeting with the President on the Multilateral Force, 4 May 1963, Box 217A, Regional Security File, NSF, JFKL.

 [42] Douglas-Home to the Cabinet, 11 March 1963, C (63) 44, Cabinet Papers (CAB) 129/112; and Douglas-Home to the Cabinet, 28 May 1963, Cabinet Memoranda C (63), 95, CAB 128/113, British National Archives, (BNA).

 [43] Annex A, Memorandum from the Secretaries of State, Defence, and the Exchequer to the Cabinet, 21 June 1963, C (63) 103, CAB 129/114, BNA.

 [44] Cabinet Conclusions, 19 September 1963, CC (63) 54, CAB 128/37, BNA.

 [45] Cabinet Conclusions, 19 September 1963, CC (63) 54, CAB 128/37, BNA.

 [46] Aide Memoir handed to the Prime Minister by the Soviet Ambassador, 11 July 1963, Premier Papers (PREM) 11/4491, 1963 – Soviet Union; Cabinet Conclusions, 19 September 1963, CC (63) 54, CAB 128/37; and Thorneycroft to the Cabinet, 28 May 1963, C (63) 96, CAB 129/113, BNA.

 [47] Cabinet Conclusions, 19 September 1963, CC (63) 54, CAB 128/37, BNA. Murray's Kennedy, Macmillan, and Nuclear Weapons, 81–158, explores the British MLF stance in greater detail. The relationship between nuclear weapons and Macmillan's hopes for détente is covered in Ashton, Kennedy, Macmillan, and the Cold War, esp. 153–226.

 [48] Thorneycroft and Douglas-Home occasionally clashed over whether the FRG actually wanted the MLF or merely wanted to please Washington. It eventually turned out that Bonn was not wedded to the force, but through mid-1964 those who feared that the MLF was the only workable solution held sway. Thorneycroft to the Cabinet, 16 September 1963, C (63) 153, CAB 129/114; and Cabinet Conclusions, 19 September 1963, CC (63) 54, CAB 128/37, BNA.

 [49] Cabinet Conclusions, 19 September 1963, CC (63) 54, CAB 128/37, BNA.

 [50] Douglas-Home to the Cabinet, 28 May 1963, Cabinet Memoranda C (63), 95, CAB 128/113, BNA.

 [51] Cabinet Conclusions, 20 September 1963, CC (63) 55, CAB 128/37, BNA.

 [52] Memorandum of Conversation, 18 February 1963, Box 217, Regional Security File, NSF, JFKL.

 [53] Bundy to Kennedy, 15 June 1963, Box 218, Regional Security File, NSF, JFKL.

 [54] Rusk to Kennedy, 6 June 1963, Box 218, Regional Security File, NSF, JFKL.

 [55] Rostow to Rusk, 17 September 1963, FRUS 1961–1963, VIII: 507–11.

 [56] National Security Action Memorandum (NSAM) 253, 13 July 1963, Box 340, Meetings and Memoranda File, NSF, JFKL; Memorandum for the Secretaries of State and Defense, 23 July 1963, ibid.; Memorandum for Holders of National Security Action Memorandum No. 253, 30 August 1963, ibid.; and Notes on a Conversation re the MLF with Mr. McGeorge Bundy, 30 August 1963, FRUS 1961–1963, XIII: 606–7.

 [57] Meeting between Rusk and Dobrynin, 18 May 1963, FRUS 1961–1963, VII: 702–5.

 [58] Meeting between Rusk and Dobrynin, 18 May 1963, FRUS 1961–1963, VII: 702–5., and Meeting between Rusk and Dobrynin, 9 February 1963, FRUS 1961–1963, VII: 647–8.

 [59] Documents on Disarmament, 1964 , 140.

 [60] Memorandum of Conversation, 17 September 1963, FRUS 1961–1963, V: 765.

 [61] Letter to Gomulka, 2 October 1963, Nuclear Non-Proliferation Collection, CWIHP.

 [62] Discussion between Kuznetsov and the SED Politburo, 14 October 1963, Nuclear Non-Proliferation Collection, CWIHP.

 [63] Discussion between Kuznetsov and the SED Politburo, 14 October 1963, Nuclear Non-Proliferation Collection, CWIHP.

 [64] Selvage, “Warsaw Pact and Non-Proliferation,” 6.

 [65] Seaborg, Stemming the Tide, 159.

 [66] “Status of East–West Negotiations,” 18 December 1963, Document CK2349340601, Declassifed Documents Reference System. The British agreed that ‘no rapid progress was likely’ in East–West relations. Cabinet Minutes, 31 October 1963, CM 3 (63), CAB 128/38; and Conversation between the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary, 19 November 1963, PREM 11/4218, BNA.

 [67] This impression owed to comments by West German officials that Bonn would not sign the NPT until the MLF issue was settled. While most US officials did not consider this threat entirely serious, they did not wish to test Bonn on this proposition. Bluth, Britain, Germany, and Western Nuclear Strategy, 161.

 [68] Meeting with the President, 10 April 1964, Box 22, Subject File, NSF, LBJL.

 [69] Harrison, Driving the Soviets up the Wall, 96–138.

 [70] Report by First Secretary János Kádár to the Hungarian Politburo, 26 July 1963, Party Leaders Collection, PHP.

 [71] Gomulka to Khrushchev, 8 October 1963, Nuclear Non-Proliferation Collection, CWIHP.

 [72] Meetings between Ulbricht and Khrushchev, 4 July 1959, Germany in the Cold War Collection, CWIHP.

 [73] Discussion between Kuznetsov and the SED Politburo, 14 October 1963, Nuclear Non-Proliferation Collection, CWIHP.

 [74] Speech by Kádár at the Hungarian Socialist Workers Party Political Committee Meeting, 17 November 1964, Hungary and the Warsaw Pact Collection, PHP.

 [75] Izvestia, 31 July 1964, in CDSP XVI, 31: 28; Khrushchev, Khrushchev on Khrushchev, 132; Sodaro, Moscow, Germany, and the West, 43–71.

 [76] Bethell, Gomulka, 242–4; Ulbricht quoted in Sodaro, Moscow, Germany, and the West, 66.

 [77] Taubman, Khrushchev, 578–619.

 [78] Stenographic Protocol of the Second Plenary Session of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party, 20–21 November 1964, Poland in the Cold War Collection, CWIHP.

 [79] Proposal of the HSWP CC Department of Foreign Relations, 13 November 1964, Hungarian Collection, PHP.

 [80] Speech by Kádár at the Hungarian Socialist Workers Party Political Committee Meeting, 17 November 1964, Hungarian Collection, PHP.

 [81] Meeting of the Deputy Foreign Ministers of the Political Consultative Committee, 10 December 1964, Deputy Foreign Ministers Collection, PHP.

 [82] Memorandum of Discussion between Gomulka and Gheorghiu-Dej, 18 January 1965, Party Leaders Collection, PHP.

 [83] Memorandum from the Discussions of the PCC, 20 January 1965, Party Leaders Collection, PHP.

 [84] As Richard Anderson notes, Brezhnev thought that confronting the West over the MLF would solidify his status as defender of world socialism. Anderson, Public Politics in an Authoritarian State, 100–110.

 [85] Pravda, 10 January 1966, in CDSP XVIII, 2: 23.

 [86] Embassy in the Soviet Union to the State Department, 23 December 1965, FRUS 1964 –1968, XI: 274.

 [87] Kosygin to Johnson, undated, Box 8, Head of State Correspondence File, NSF, LBJL.

 [88] Memorandum of Conversation, 19 May 1965, FRUS 1964–1948, XI: 203–5.

 [89] Summary Notes of 543^rd NSC Meeting, 17 October 1964, Box 1, NSC Meetings, NSF, LBJL.

 [90] President's Meeting with Congressional Leadership, 19 October 1964, Volume I, Bundy Files, NSF, LBJL.

 [91] NIE 4-2-64, 21 October 1964, Box 1, NIEs, NSF, LBJL.

 [92] Telephone Conversation between Bundy and Ball, 29 October 1964, Box 3, Papers of George Ball, LBJL.

 [93] Bundy to Rusk, Ball, and McNamara, 25 November 1964, Box 2, Memos to the President, NSF, LBJL.

 [94] NSAM 318, 18 November 1964, Box 7, NSAMs, NSF, LBJL; and NSAM 322, 17 December 1964, Box 6, ibid.

 [95] Report to the President, 21 January 1965, Box 8, Committee File, NSF, LBJL. On the evolution of the committee's position, see Brands, “Rethinking Non-Proliferation.”

 [96] Report to the President, 21 January 1965, Box 8, Committee File, NSF, LBJL.

 [97] Pravda, 14 November 1964, in CDSP XVI, 46: 19.

 [98] Entretien entre M. Alphand et M. Dobynine (Interview between Alphand and Dobrynin), 8 October 1964, DDF 1964, II: 323.

 [99] Pravda, 15 February 1967, in CDSP XIX, 7: 20.

[100] “Report by A.A. Gromyko in Answer to Inquiries by USSR Supreme Soviet Deputies,” 10 December 1965, in CDSP XVII, 51: 3. See also Izvestia, 23 October 1966, in CDSP XVIII, 43: 15.

[101] Reprinted in Kulski, The Soviet Union in World Affairs, 41.

[102] Memorandum from the Discussions of the PCC, 20 January 1965, Party Leaders Collection, PHP.

[103] Memorandum of Conversation, 21 July 1965, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 221.

[104] Rusk to Johnson, undated, Box 35, Subject File, LBJL; and Bundy to various, 23 January 1965 (misdated as 1964), Box 2, Memos to the President, NSF, LBJL.

[105] George McGhee Oral History Interview, 1 October 1969, Oral Histories, LBJL.

[106] Foster, “New Directions in Arms Control and Disarmament,” 600; Keeny to Bundy, May 4, 1965, Box 5, Agency Files, NSF, LBJL; Kelleher, Germany and the Politics of Nuclear Weapons, 257.

[107] Spurgeon Keeny, “The Non-Proliferation Treaty,” 24 December 1968, 1–3, Box 55, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL.

[108] Foster to Johnson, 7 October 1965, Box 25, Subject File, NSF, LBJL.

[109] Meeting of the NSC, 9 June 1966, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 330–32.

[110] McNamara to Rusk, 7 June 1966, Box 30, Papers of Francis Bator, NSF, LBJL.

[111] Cabinet Conclusions, 26 November 1964, CC 11 (64), CAB 128/39, BNA; also Dockrill, “Forging the Anglo-American Global Defence Partnership,” esp. 114.

[112] Tyler to Rusk, 8 March 1965, FRUS 1964–1968, XIII: 188–9.

[113] Cabinet Conclusions, 30 March 1965, CC (65) 19, CAB 128/39, BNA. On the Atlantic Nuclear Force, see Chalfont, The Shadow of My Hand, 104; and Young, “Killing the MLF?”

[114] Cabinet Conclusions, 23 September 1965, CC (65) 49, CAB 128/39, BNA. See also Gordon Walker to the Cabinet, 5 August 1965, C (65) 119, CAB 129/122, BNA.

[115] Memorandum of Conversation, 1 August 1965, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 233–5; Aide-Memoire from the British Embassy to the State Department, 1 June 1966, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 325–6. London also asked Moscow to reopen negotiations on the NPT. Chalfont, The Shadow of My Hand, 112.

[116] Canadian Department of External Affairs, Report, 11; Mission in Geneva to the State Department, 18 August 1966, Box 56, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL; Donaghy, Tolerant Allies, 107.

[117] Mission in Geneva to the State Department, August 10, 1966, Box 56, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL; “Non-Proliferation Treaty,” 86–7, Box 1, ACDA Administrative History, LBJL.

[118] Ibid., 89; State Department to various posts, 21 June 1966, Box 56, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL.

[119] Foster to Rusk, 25 May 1966, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 323–5.

[120] Kelleher, Germany and the Politics of Nuclear Weapons, 261; Heuser, NATO, Britain, France, and the FRG, 132–41; Memo for the President, 10 September 1966, Box 187, Country File, NSF, LBJL.

[121] Memorandum of Conversation, 20 December 1965, Box 192, Country File, NSF, LBJL; State Department to various posts, 28 December 1965, ibid., Embassy in Bonn to the State Department, 2 July 1966, Box 186, Country File, NSF, LBJL. Erhard also implied that he would demand concessions from the Soviet bloc on German reunification before he agreed to relinquish the MLF. Given Eastern Bloc fears of a united Germany and the fact that Washington did not support this ploy, however, it was not a realistic scenario. Embassy in Bonn to the State Department, 2 July 1966, Box 186, Country File, NSF, LBJL; “Bilateral Relations: Germany,” 24, Box 1, State Department Administrative History Files, LBJL.

[122] Edmonds, Soviet Foreign Policy in the Brezhnev Years, 49.

[123] Izvestia, 21 October 1965, in CDSP XVII, 42: 21–2.

[124] Minutes of the Warsaw Pact Deputy Foreign Ministers Meeting, 26–27 February 1968, Deputy Foreign Ministers Collection, PHP.

[125] Telegram from Kohler to the State Department, 23 December 1965, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 274–5.

[126] Memorandum of Conversation, 10 October 1966, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 386.

[127] Report of Meeting of Foreign Ministers, 17 June 1966, Foreign Ministers Collection, PHP.

[128] Foster to Rusk, 25 May 1966, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 323–5.

[129] Mission in Geneva to the State Department, 23 July 1966, Box 56, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL.

[130] The ‘European option’ was a concession to the Germans, and was not taken seriously by Moscow or Washington. Neither superpower thought it likely that the West European states would form a true union in the near future. Roberts, The Nuclear Years, 71–72; “Recent Correspondence between the President and the Chancellor on Non-Proliferation Treaty,” undated (1966), Box 26, Subject File, NSF, LBJL.

[131] Foster to Rusk, 25 May 1966, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 323–5.

[132] Keeny, “Non-Proliferation Treaty,” 1–6, Box 55, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL.

[133] See ibid., 3–6; and Foster to Rusk, 30 August 1966, Box 56, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL.

[134] Memorandum of Conversation, 26 September 1966, FRUS 1964–1968, XIII: 472; Hafterndorn, NATO and the Nuclear Revolution, 169; “NATO Nuclear Problem,” 14, Box 1, State Department Administrative History File, LBJL; Schwartz, Lyndon Johnson and Europe, 51–3.

[135] These concessions had been proposed during the summer of 1966 after developments in India motivated Johnson to seek a compromise on the NPT. Foster to Rusk, 30 August 1966, Non-Proliferation Collection, National Security Archive, Washington, DC; McNamara to Rusk, 7 June 1966, Box 30, Bator Papers, LBJL; and Rostow to Johnson 2 September 1966, Box 11, Rostow Files, NSF, LBJL.

[136] Keeny, “Non-Proliferation Treaty,” 24 December 1968, 1–5, Box 55, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL.

[137] Memoranda of Conversations, 22, 24 September and 10 October 1966, FRUS 1964–1968, XI: 368–82, 385–91, 393–4; Keeny, “Non-Proliferation Treaty,” 4–6, Box 55, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL; “NATO Nuclear Problem,” 27, Box 1, State Department Administrative History File, LBJL.

[138] Keeny, “Non-Proliferation Treaty,” 6, Box 55, NSC Histories File, NSF, LBJL.

[139] Documents on Disarmament, 1968 , 156–8; Roberts, The Nuclear Years, 74; Quester, The Politics of Nuclear Proliferation, esp. 23.

[140] Rostow to Johnson, 21 May 1966, Box 7, Memos to the President, NSF, LBJL.

[141] Sodaro, Moscow, Germany, and the West, 95.

[142] “Statement by Kosygin at Signing of Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons,” 31 June 1968, in CDSP XX, 27: 3. The Kremlin also agreed at this time to begin strategic arms limitation talks. On the links between the NPT and SALT, see Brands, “Progress Unseen.”

[143] Minutes of the Warsaw Pact Deputy Foreign Ministers Meeting, 26–27 February 1968, Deputy Foreign Ministers Collection, PHP.

[144] NSAM 351, 10 July 1966, Box 8, National Security Action Memoranda, NSF, LBJL; NSAM 355, 1 August 1966, Box 9, ibid.; Ganguly, Conflict Unending, 102–4; and Hersch, The Sampson Option, 184–94.

[145] The Nixon administration, now cultivating China as an ally, declined to so do. Suri, Power and Protest, 235–6.

[146] On the waning of superpower hegemony in the 1960s, see Brands, The Wages of Globalism; and Rostow, The Diffusion of Power.

[147] Foster, “New Directions in Arms Control and Disarmament,” 600. There were cases, of course, in which the US reversal pleased its allies, most notably the British and Canadians.

[148] Directorate of Intelligence, “Status of Negotiations on the Nonproliferation Treaty,” 8 May 1967, Box 26, Subject File, NSF, LBJL; also Haftendorn, NATO and the Nuclear Revolution, 151–2.

[149] Telegram from Bonn to the State Department, 25 February 1967, FRUS 1964–1968, XV: 493–4.

[150] Paper Prepared in the State Department, 5 May 1968, FRUS 1964–1968, XV: 662–9. It might be added, though, that FRG adherence to the treaty, which implied an acceptance of the strategic status quo in Europe, may be viewed as a precursor to Ostpolitik.

[151] “Note de la Direction Des Affaires Politiques: Non-dissémination des armes nucléaires” (Note from the Director of Political Affairs: Nuclear Non-Dissemination), 17 August 1965, DDF 1965, II: 248. See also Costigliola, France and the United States, especially 146–9. The French did later pledge to abide by the spirit of the treaty. The diffusion of power within the alliance is covered in Schwartz, Lyndon Johnson and Europe; and Kaplan, The Long Entanglement, 99–147.

[152] Report on the Warsaw Pact Summit Meeting, 27 October 1966, Hungary and the Warsaw Pact Collection, PHP.

[153] Minutes of the Warsaw Pact Deputy Foreign Ministers Meeting, 26–27 February 1968, Deputy Foreign Ministers Collection, PHP.

[154] Minutes of the Warsaw Pact Deputy Foreign Ministers Meeting, 26–27 February 1968, Deputy Foreign Ministers Collection, PHP. On Romania's alienation from Moscow, see Deletant and Ionescu, “Romania and the Warsaw Pact, 1955–1989,” esp. 16–22.

[155] The classic treatments of détente are Garthoff, Détente and Confrontation; and Gaddis, Strategies of Containment, 272–341. A reinterpretation that still places détente's emergence in the Nixon years is Suri, Power and Protest. Those few scholars who have located détente in the Johnson years have generally focused more on SALT than the NPT. See Schwartz, Lyndon Johnson and Europe, 206–11; and Dallek, Flawed Giant, 432–5.

[156] The influence of lesser powers on superpowers is discussed in Smith, “New Bottles for New Wine”; Harrison, Driving the Soviets up the Wall; and Hershberg, “The Crisis Years, 1958–1963.”

[157] The idea of symmetry is prominent in recent work. See Suri, Power and Protest; and Mastny, “Was 1968 a Strategic Watershed of the Cold War?”

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Hal Brands

Hal Brands is a Ph.D. student at Yale University. He has published articles in Diplomatic History, the Journal of Cold War Studies, the Pacific Historical Review, and other journals. His first book, From Berlin to Baghdad: America's Search for Purpose in the Post-Cold War World, will be published in early 2008. He is currently writing an international history of the Cold War in Latin America.