American Acceptance
MR. DEAN RUSK 'S European tour appears to have convinced him that, since President de Gaulle is unwilling to discuss the integration of France's deterrent within NATO until the weapon is actually in existence, the whole question. of the relationship of European nuclear forces to.the, US deterrent power and to each other will be best left until later. The US Government has apparently given up hope pf dissuading France from its nuclear ambitions and decided to accept gracefully what it cannot pre:. vent. Since, as Mr. Hedley Bull points out else- where in this issue, it is easily within the capacity of the European powers to achieve a level of nuclear deterrence which would be effective for the purposes they desire, Washington will soon have to decide which formula it wishes to adopt in order to link these national forces with NATO. The obvious course (and one which would further European unity) would be for the US to give its blessing to a European deterrent controlled by that political equivalent of the Econbmic Community which is bound to develop as the integration of Europe proceeds. From the American point of view, British participation in the Community is a guarantee that the North Atlantic point of view will be strongly represented and British possession of nuclear arms is a safe- guard against a possible situation in which French Possession of a deterrent would allow French policies to play a dominant role within an increasingly united Western Europe. The sue= cess of the present negotiations in Brussels is, therefore, more and more necessary to American foreign policy as conceived by President Ken- nedy. Mr. Rusk's tour has emphasised a pattern which has been clear for some time as well as achieving a withdrawal in good order from the extreme American position on national deter- rents. Whether .there is a connection between Washington's apparent acceptance of France's nuclear ambitions and its desire to see Britain into the Community is obscure, but there is a shape to recent diplomatic activity that can hardly be coincidental.
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