The Frustrated West

The week's other conference was not menaced by euphoric Chinese.

In Oslo, foreign ministers of NATO nations assembled in a gold-and-raspberry chamber of Oslo's Parliament building for a critical look at the new U.S. Secretary of State and his program for Europe.

Holy Terrors. While Dean Rusk got a warm personal welcome, his policy proposals got a chilly reception. When he emphasized the U.S. desire for a NATO buildup of conventional forces, the delegates shifted restively. Britain clearly has no intention of restoring conscription. France remained silent about any planned redeployment of the 500,000 troops pinned down in Algeria. Small powers such as Norway argued that what is needed to defend Western Europe is not more troops but better conventional weapons.

Originally, the NATO military forces on the Continent were conceived as a shield to fend off the Red army while the U.S. wielded the "sword"--"massive re taliation" with the atomic bomb. But then the U.S. had a nuclear monopoly. Today, with the Soviet Union capable of inflicting at least equal nuclear damage on the U.S., the Western European nations want a clear statement of Washington's intentions. France, as the most vocal, has wondered aloud if any U.S. President is prepared to sacrifice New York to save Paris. De Gaulle's bootstrap effort to create his own bomb is largely designed to serve his vision of grandeur. But the justification he offers is that French towns will remain safe only if France has the power to retaliate against Russian towns.

To quiet their uneasiness, Rusk assured the foreign ministers that the U.S. "intended to keep its forces at full strength in NATO"; these forces were equipped with a full array of tactical atomic weapons that could match anything the Russians could throw. The need for a boost in conventional forces was only so that NATO forces in Europe could answer "small fire alarms with something beside an all-out nuclear response."

Rusk also produced a plan, echoing a suggestion made last December by then Secretary of State Christian Herter, that NATO take "control" of five U.S. Polaris submarines. But the offer was so hedged with restrictions--the subs will continue to have U.S. crews and be under direct U.S. command--that Britain's Foreign Secretary Lord Home was not aware precisely what Rusk was offering until he left the meeting and got a briefing from his own experts. The obscurity was deliberate, for the reality is that President Kennedy has not yet decided whether to equip NATO with its own nuclear arms and, if so, under what conditions.

On Berlin, Rusk was forceful. He said that the U.S. expected a new Russian-induced crisis over the West's island in Communist East Germany this summer or fall. Weighing his words carefully, he declared that if the Russians threatened to sign a separate peace treaty with East Germany, "they should be left in no doubt that we consider such a treaty a violation of the legal situation in Berlin." Any obstruction to Western access to Berlin, he made clear, will be countered with military force, if necessary.

Thus, as usual for NATO meetings, the total result was little more than the ex change of exhortations and reassurances. For beyond all the squabbling, all 15 member nations are deeply committed to the basic NATO tenet: an attack on one is an attack on all. Rusk personally won better than a passing grade. By meeting's end, NATO delegates rated him more professional and tougher than Christian Herter, less dogmatic and bossy than the late John Foster Dulles--but still not up to Dulles at his commanding best.

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