Years of Upheaval

by Henry Kissinger

  The final session, in which all ministers participated, foreshadowed the stalemate. Nixon made an impassioned speech reiterating his admiration for de Gaulle. He deplored his predecessors’ failure to understand that great leader; he was determined, he said, to overcome what suspicions remained. He would insist that members of his Administration treat France on the basis of trust and cooperation.

  Nixon never fully understood that panegyrics on de Gaulle tended to irritate Pompidou more than reassure him. Heads of government generally prefer to distinguish themselves from their predecessors rather than be considered in their shadow. After all, de Gaulle had dismissed Pompidou as Prime Minister, and only his unexpected resignation had saved Pompidou from oblivion.

  Pompidou, at any rate, felt no obligation to reciprocate. He replied sardonically: “President Nixon and I were matching Gaullisms but there was neither victory nor vanquished” — a formula always uttered by the side that believes it has won. Lest anyone suffer from the illusion that anything had been achieved, he added: “We did not try to decide anything.” Pompidou was witty but opaque about just what had been accomplished:

  We share our inner thoughts, we did not agree on all the methods, but we do agree on our general interests and that France and the U.S. are guided not only by a sentimental tradition but by a community of deep interests. I am convinced that this conference has not given birth to anything, but it bears a seed for the future, and conception is more fun than delivering.

  What seed had been planted Pompidou would not reveal to us. There was little doubt, however, that its planting had not been that much fun and that the species had a long gestation period.

  Almost immediately a new controversy broke out. The delegations had not left Iceland when a French spokesman, telling the press on background that further consultations would be bilateral, played down the idea of a deputy foreign ministers’ meeting and oozed skepticism about an Atlantic Declaration. Our own briefing had necessarily given the contrary emphasis. The fact that I had personally cleared the text of our quite different public statement with Pompidou did nothing to cool tempers.

  The next few days left no doubt that it was the French briefer who had correctly understood Pompidou, as we should have known from the beginning. The permanent head of the Quai d’Orsay, the elegant Geoffroy de Courcel, whom we knew as an old-line Gaullist, repeated to Ambassador John Irwin on the return trip to Paris from Iceland that France’s obligation to the European Community stood in the way of a consultation by the Big Four. This delicacy toward its partners came as news to us; France had for years participated in restricted meetings of the Big Four finance ministers and had bitterly resisted the inclusion of any others. Nor did this solicitude extend to giving France’s partners an opportunity to participate in the diplomacy of the Year of Europe. At a meeting of the European Community foreign ministers on June 5, Jobert opposed a summit meeting of the Community with the President because it would be unseemly for all the Europeans to flock around Nixon. While he was at it, Jobert also contradicted what he interpreted as our excessively optimistic briefing of the Reykjavik meeting, blocked the appointment of an ad hoc group to prepare a European position for the Atlantic dialogue, and flatly opposed any kind of Atlantic Declaration.

  In these conditions, my meeting in Paris with Jobert on June 8 turned into a duel. If a restricted group was impossible and a meeting of all the Community members unseemly, what forum was left? Jobert, after reiterating his view that we were pursuing the Year of Europe for domestic reasons, insisted on bilateral consultations — the one result of Reykjavik he seemed eager to affirm. And he returned to his obsessive demand that we produce our nonexistent draft charter. Bilateral talks should start by our showing him whatever documents we had.

  The unfortunate fact was that because of an excess of scrupulous concern for European and specifically French sensibilities, we still did not have any draft. We were waiting for some consultation so that we did not seem to be imposing our views. I suggested that the Four try their hand at a document, with each country taking primary responsibility for one section in first draft — all the exchanges to take place on a bilateral basis. This was a more than clumsy procedure but it reached out to meet French concerns.

  Jobert at first seemed sympathetic. France would write the section on the political evolution of Europe. Later in the meeting he seemed to suggest that everybody — France, Britain, West Germany, and the United States — should be asked to produce a comprehensive draft. But, once again, before any work could start, Jobert wished to see our own document. Convinced that we would get nowhere unless we showed him something, I agreed to produce a draft by the time he came to America at the end of June. He in turn indicated that he would do some drafting of his own, perhaps in response to our version. Painful as it is for me to admit it, I had fallen into another trap. For once I gave Jobert a draft I was at his mercy. If I showed it to other allies he would accuse us of ganging up on him. If I waited for his response, he could begin undermining our position with his partners by nitpicking it or stop its going forward at all.

  The anomaly of our position was illustrated the next day when, still in Paris, I had a meeting with Joseph Luns, who had recently become Secretary General of NATO. In many ways Joseph Luns was symbolic of the changes in the Atlantic relationship. When I first met him he was Foreign Minister of the Netherlands in a cabinet of sturdy, moderately conservative, strongly pro-NATO orientation. We knew Luns as a staunch friend of the United States, a combative defender of NATO unity. He had become such a fixture that when he visited Washington in 1969 to convince us, with his affectionately browbeating tactics, that we should grant additional landing rights to KLM, the Dutch airline, Elliot Richardson, then Under Secretary of State, introduced him at a State Department luncheon as follows: “Dutch-American relations go back 300 years and Joseph Luns has been foreign minister for the greater part of that period.”

  But within the space of a few years he had become an anachronism in his own country. The Dutch political spectrum tilted sharply to the left; the security dimension of NATO was de-emphasized; a spirit of moralistic semineutralism flourished. Luns, with his insistence that the West represented absolute values worth defending, had no place in such a structure. He disappeared as Foreign Minister and his compatriots were relieved when his appointment to NATO removed him from the Dutch political arena. In Brussels his passionate nature earned him snickers among the cool representatives of the modern trend as well as the admiration and affection of those of us who knew how essential it was that the crucial post of Secretary General be filled by a strong personality deeply convinced of the moral importance of the unity of the democracies.

  Luns had the distinction of being the first European leader to welcome our initiative unequivocally. Unfortunately, he represented no government. And the institution for which he spoke was not one of France’s favorites. Luns told me that he had written to all Alliance foreign ministers commending our initiative and offering NATO’s good offices in any consultations. He was prepared to use the weekly luncheons of NATO’s permanent representatives to take soundings and even begin drafting a document. He was asking for guidance. But France stood in the way. As a result of Jobert’s maneuvers, we were being precluded from talking to those who wanted to be helpful (for fear of being accused of seeking to isolate France) and confined to those who were not disposed to be cooperative.

  I was not yet prepared to give up on Jobert or to cross Pompidou without one more effort, so I evaded a recommendation. I told Luns that I wanted to wait for the exchange of drafts with Jobert before involving NATO institutionally. We had no choice, I said, for if France turned against the Year of Europe it would wither anyway. Luns went along with me, though silent acquiescence was not his strong point. He did not like maneuver; his normal style when confronted with an obstacle was to bulldoze it into submission. He warned that some of the smaller countries were restive. He was right. But we thought we had to choose between the ir
ritation of the smaller countries and the outright opposition of France, whose stalling would have at least the moral support of Britain and the acquiescence of the Federal Republic.

  Waiting for Jobert

  BY the end of June 1973 we were treading water. Two months after our initiative, no one had yet put forward any concrete idea of what the Year of Europe should contain. There did not exist a work program or a forum for discussion or even a formal European reply. I was waiting for Jobert. Two versions of my promised draft were being readied for his visit: a somewhat longish text prepared by the State Department putting forth our objectives in a manner so conciliatory that few sharp edges remained; and a more succinct and probably more contentious document prepared by my own staff.

  On June 27 Etienne Davignon, the Director General for Political Affairs of the Belgian Foreign Ministry, visited Washington. A strong defender of European institutions, he had demonstrated that intelligence and dedication could, within the framework of a united Europe, achieve an influence disproportionate to the power of one’s country. Before visiting me in San Clemente, he called on Under Secretary of State William Porter and Assistant Secretary for European Affairs Walter Stoessel. From the point of view of the European Community, Davignon carried approximately the same message as Luns. He feared that our bilateral dealings with France were undermining the ability of the other eight members of the European Community to move France toward conciliation. A redefinition of Community relations with the United States was imperative because most disputes would arise in the area of Community competence, not within NATO. Jobert, according to Davignon, was blocking progress at Community meetings with two arguments: that no decision should be taken pending his further consultation with the United States; and that there was no hurry anyway because the status quo was hardly disadvantageous and, as France had shown, it was not necessary to agree with Washington to have good relations with it. Everything thus depended on Jobert, who was coming to see me in San Clemente on June 29 and 30.

  Important moments in diplomacy frequently occur in incongruous settings. The Western White House consisted of two rows of one-story, prefabricated buildings parallel to each other and separated by a cement walkway. The eastern row contained a conference room, a reception area, staff and administrative offices, and a small dining room. The other faced the ocean; it contained four offices each with an anteroom for secretaries. Propinquity to the President’s office is one of the better ways of judging the relative importance of White House aides. On this basis, the hierarchy of White House aides had been Haldeman, Ehrlichman, and me in that order. The whole edifice had been built, under the pressure of Haldeman’s merciless lashing, in three months between April and July 1969 so that it was ready for Nixon’s summer retreat. (Since Nixon insisted that he never took vacations, his sojourns in San Clemente were presented as moving the working White House to the West Coast.) Each of the main offices had a little patio, helpfully equipped with telephone console, overlooking the President’s golf course. Beyond it was the Pacific Ocean.

  It was on my patio in the bright California sun that Michel Jobert and I resumed our sparring — as yet maintaining the facade of being partners in a joint enterprise. Jobert had read enough of French military history to be attracted to the value of an immediate attack. He opened by requesting that we cease briefing his partners in the European Community — perhaps a reference to the Davignon visit. Jobert had brought nothing — no draft, no proposed procedure, no forum for further discussion. Indeed, he strongly implied that his prime purpose in coming had been to be briefed about Nixon’s just-concluded summit with Brezhnev. Most of our conversation was taken up by that. When we at last returned to the Year of Europe, Jobert suggested his reason for traveling all the way to San Clemente was simply to collect our draft of the Atlantic Declaration — surely a time-consuming method in the age of telecommunication. As a sign of good faith I gave him both our drafts — usually a poof procedure because it enables the opposite number to choose what is most advantageous to him and to learn of one’s internal disagreements. Jobert refused to read them there. He would “read and study” — or else he would “study and read.” He would do almost anything except make progress. If he agreed with our draft, things would be easy; we would then move to multilateral forums. He did not say what would happen if he disagreed.

  Jobert’s visit was best epitomized by a disastrous dinner I gave for him in Los Angeles. I had invited distinguished representatives of politics, business, and the entertainment industry. Matters proceeded smoothly enough until Jobert rose to reply to my toast, using the French language. My friend the performer and unpredictable genius Danny Kaye, not fully familiar with diplomatic protocol, interrupted to inquire into the choice of language; he had noted that Jobert spoke excellent English. Would the French Foreign Minister not speak in a tongue most of the guests understood? Jobert replied coldly that he was speaking in French for the benefit of the party traveling with him. Danny Kaye offered to solve this problem by interpreting.

  To my amazement Jobert, perhaps because he had never encountered someone like Danny Kaye at a diplomatic function, acquiesced. He delivered an elegant enough toast in English, which Danny proceeded to render in a stentorian voice in his wholly nonsensical, double-talk version of French — a nonexistent language that had the maddening quality of catching the precise intonation of French and whole snatches of French phrases, so that the uninitiated required several minutes of straining to realize they were being put on. Jobert seemed not amused. On the other hand, it was a case of art not so much imitating as encapsuling life: Our dialogue was beginning to approach Danny Kaye’s elegant gibberish.

  While waiting for Jobert’s reply or counterdraft, we sought to advance the transatlantic dialogue — this time with the Federal Republic of Germany. But nothing concerning the Year of Europe was to prove easy.

  Since Willy Brandt had assumed the Chancellorship, Nixon’s confidential exchanges with him had gone via Egon Bahr. I had discussed our project with Bahr at the beginning of the year; he had indicated support in a memorandum in early April; it was only natural that we would turn to him again. I had invited Bahr to come to Washington following my San Clemente meeting with Jobert. After accepting tentatively, he canceled his trip without explanation. On June 30 I repeated my invitation. Jobert, in the meantime, had done his bit to muddy the waters by informing the German Foreign Minister, Walter Scheel, that I considered Bahr my interlocutor on the Year of Europe, thus guaranteeing an internal German row over prerogatives.

  On July 2 Nixon sent a cable to Brandt informing him of the conversations with Jobert (this was necessary in part to keep the French version from being the sole briefing available in Bonn). He invited Brandt to send a representative to Washington for bilateral US–German talks so that an Atlantic Declaration could be completed before Nixon’s visit to Europe in the fall. He left it to Brandt to designate the representative.

  Brandt replied coldly on July 7. He did not respond to the hint of a European trip by Nixon in the fall; he simply ignored it. He did agree to bilateral talks on the Atlantic Declaration, which he described modestly as “some general principles concerning the gradual development of relations between the United States of America and a uniting of Western Europe.” Clearly, the Year of Europe was in no danger from excessive German enthusiasm.

  Brandt’s letter now designated Foreign Minister Walter Scheel for bilateral explorations. Either Bahr had lost a bureaucratic battle or else Brandt did not want to be too closely identified personally with the Year of Europe. Perhaps both.

  Debonair and exuding soothing formulas, Walter Scheel arrived in Washington on July 12. His air of easy camaraderie tended to create the impression that he was veneer all the way through. But that was a grave error. A conciliatory manner was allied with a first-class intelligence. He skillfully pursued Ostpolitik but there was never the slightest question about his commitment to the unity of the West. That he was made of stern material was shown b
y the skill with which, as leader of the Free Democratic Party, he moved it from slightly right of center to slightly left, a subtle shift that preserved it as the balance wheel of German politics and gave it an influence out of proportion to its numbers. There was no doubt where Scheel, a devout believer in democracy, stood on the philosophical conflicts of our age. Yet I had the impression that he thought the wisest course for his country was to achieve the degree of freedom of maneuver that had been so crucial for his party in domestic politics. Scheel well understood the pivotal importance of the American connection for Germany’s security and hence its diplomacy. He had brought with him the outline of a draft declaration. It was the meatiest draft anyone had produced and the one most in accord with our basic approach. I urged Scheel to turn it into a formal document. He promised to do so within two to three weeks. We never saw it again; it fell victim to French pressure and the disintegration of the dialogue a few weeks later.

  Scheel’s helpfulness on substance did not extend to procedures. His desire for a Presidential visit was as inhibited as Brandt’s. The only hint as to a date he could bring himself to advance was that it should take place sometime before the end of the European Security Conference. Since the conference had just assembled the previous week and was guaranteed a run of a few years, this created no great pressure to begin the planning. Scheel repeated the by-now familiar procedural dilemma that it was relatively easy to assemble the heads of government at NATO but difficult to discuss economic subjects or European-American relations there, while it was possible to discuss these subjects within the framework of the European Community, though not in the presence of heads of government.

  Scheel’s solution was that there be two declarations, one on subjects within the province of NATO and the other for those applicable to the European Community. But in attempting this, the old perplexities returned. France would not stand for a meeting between the heads of government of the Community and the American President. Scheel offered the suggestion that the President might meet in Brussels with the President of the European Commission (a civil servant), the President of the European Community (who, in the rotation by which the post was filled, would be the Danish Prime Minister for the next six months), and the nine foreign ministers in their capacity as members of the Political Consultative Committee. It was a preposterous proposition that heads of government, having first guaranteed Western security at a NATO meeting, would refuse to discuss economic and political issues in the same town with the President and instead delegate these topics to their foreign ministers. I pointed out the additional absurdity that almost all our allies were pressing us to agree to a summit with Leonid Brezhnev at the conclusion of the European Security Conference. Why were they reluctant to commit themselves to a summit meeting with the President of the United States? What was it that made a meeting with Brezhnev so much easier? Scheel would not budge. We deferred a decision until the outcome of drafting.