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378 Foreign Relations, 1958-1960, Volume IX


147. Telegram From the Embassy in France to the Department of
      State


                                          Paris, May 6, 1960, 8 p.m.

    5193. Geneva for Eaton. Department pass Defense for Irwin.
Noforn from Thurston. Embtel 5142.1 There were no surprises in Gen-
eral Norstad's two-hour session with Chancellor Adenauer yesterday.2
Except for initial allusion by Adenauer to Khrushchev's Supreme Soviet
speech and airplane incident, discussion was devoted entirely to Euro-
pean control and inspection plan. Von Brentano, Strauss and Heusinger
were present, as well as Ambassador Dowling.
    Norstad spoke from briefing charts and carefully stressed military
advantages of plan. Chancellor was very attentive throughout and in-
terrupted frequently with questions and observations of both political
and military import. These were all of a critical or negative nature.
Norstad avoided being drawn into discussion of political factors, in-
cluding those relating to German domestic politics. Despite fact that
throughout discussion Chancellor took uniformly unfavorable position,
atmosphere was friendly and relaxed and Adenauer made point of his
friendly feeling towards and respect for SACEUR. At very end of ses-
sion Adenauer expressed his gratitude to Norstad for coming and said
that it had given him &quot;food for thought.&quot; Meeting broke up on note
struck by Strauss that plans of this kind will be requiring continuous
consideration and that further discussion of this one might well take
place at some time in the future. Full account of discussion being air-
mailed to recipients this message.
                                                         Houghton


    Source: Department of State, Central Files, 600.00121/5-660. Secret;
Priority; Limit
Distribution. Repeated to Bonn, London, and Geneva.
    1 Dated May 4, telegram 5142 from Paris reported that Brentano would
discuss the
inspection plan for Central Europe with Norstad on May 5. (Ibid., 600.00121/5-460)
    2The meeting took place at Bonn on May 5.
    3An 8-page memorandum of this conversation is in Department of State,
Central
Files, 600.0012/5-560.


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