FOREIGN RELATIONS, 1,950., VOLUME I


strength. The Department, however, in maintaining the necessity for
such an arrangement, would wish to have the agreement and support
of the Department of Defense and the AEC to the extent of their
respective legitimate interests.
   It must be recognized that in the field of weapons research, develop-
 ment and production, with the exception of the duration of the agree-
 ment-which still is open for discussion-it would appear that the
 British position is very near the position which we were authorized
 to explore with them   in the National Security Council paper of
 March 2, 1949,6 as approved by the President. The British seem to have
 met us very closely on the questions of base rights, joint training
 programs, and other such military arrangements as the Department
 of Defense has thought desirable. This also is in line with-the March 2
 NSC paper on the U.S. objectives. As regards the question of storage
 of weapons, although the U.K. and U.S. approaches are different, the
 end result may well turn out to be the same.
 The areas in which, at the present at least, the explorations have indi-
 cated that the British position may differ substantially from the ob-
 jectives outlined in the March 2 NSC paper are (1) research, develop-
 ment, and production in the area from raw materials to fissionable
 materials and (2) the area of further development (atomic power)
 not directly related to atomic weapons. In these areas the March 2
 paper indicated that the U.S. interest lay in securing both complete
 exchange of information and complete collaboration throughouit the
 entire program with the major production effort being in this country
 and all decisions with respect to the program being considered from
 the point of view of what will lead to the maximum advance in the
 combined program. The position of the U.K., on the other hand, is
 that while they are prepared to meet our point of view in this field to
 the extent of limiting those production operations which might hamper
 ours because of a competing drain on raw materials, and while in fact
 they do not contemplate a great deal over ,and above that which they
 would do if the principle of maximum combined effort were adopted,
they are not prepared to accept that principle as a guide for their
future decisions in the areas other than that of atomic weapons. The
British are of the view that they should be free to undertake .work in
the ore-to-fissionable-materials area so long as such work does not

   On March 2, 1949, a Special Committee of the National Security Council
con-
sisting of the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Defense, and the Chairman
of
the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, submitted a report to President Truman
recommending negotiations with .the United Kingdom and Canada looking -toward
regularization of cooperation in the 'field of atomic energy, cooperation
which had
been sporadic and which rested on an uncertain basis since the conclusion
of the
Second World War and the passage ,of the Atomic Energy Act of 1946 (PL 585,
79 Cong., 60 Stat. 755). For the report of the Special Committee and documenta-
tion on efforts pursuant thereto, see Foreign Relations, 1949, vol. i, pp.
443 ff.


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