They had not talked together before. When Jacqueline met de Gaulle at the embassy in Washington during his visit in 1960, Kennedy had been campaigning in Oregon. Now the two men sat alone with their interpreters in the splendid presidential office in the Elysée Palace. De Gaulle had courteously provided American and French cigarettes for his visitor. Kennedy, equally courteous and remembering that tobacco troubled his host’s sensitive eyes, refrained from smoking them (and also from smoking the cigars he had in his pocket).
Wasting little time in preliminaries, Kennedy cited Khrushchev’s warnings to Thompson about Berlin. He saw two possibilities for the allies in view of the evident Russian determination to press the issue: either to refuse discussions on the ground that the rights of presence and access and the status of Berlin were not negotiable, or to give an appearance of negotiation by opening the future status of Berlin as a subject for discussion. De Gaulle commented that Khrushchev had been threatening action on Berlin and laying down six-month deadlines for two and a half years. Surely if he planned to go to war over Berlin, he would have done so already. He recalled his own remark to Khrushchev that, while it was too bad that Berlin was situated in the Soviet zone, there it was, and its future could be solved only within a framework of general détente and disarmament.
The problem, Kennedy said, was whether Khrushchev really believed in the firmness of the west; even President de Gaulle himself had recently questioned whether the United States was ready to defend Paris at the risk of the obliteration of New York. De Gaulle remarked that the west simply could not retreat; it could not withdraw its troops or accept obstacles to access or permit a change in the status of West Berlin. Make it clear, he advised Kennedy, that it was the Russians, and not the west, who sought a change; we were not asking for anything. The allies could not stop Khrushchev from signing whatever he wanted with East Germany, but no internal communist document could alter the status of Berlin. If Khrushchev wanted war, he must understand that he would have it at the first moment he used force against us. De Gaulle added that the west could not win a military victory in Berlin; Khrushchev must be made to recognize that fighting around Berlin would mean a general war. The General insisted again that this was the last thing Khrushchev wanted.
But now it was time for luncheon. Jacqueline sat by the General and engaged him in animated conversation in French about French history—Louis XVI, and the Duc d’Angoulême and the dynastic complexities of the later Bourbons—until de Gaulle leaned across the table and told Kennedy that his wife knew more French history than most French women. (Kennedy, delighted, later said that it was as if Mme. de Gaulle had sat next to him and asked him all about Henry Clay.) It was a gay occasion. At one point, de Gaulle gestured at McGeorge Bundy, who was sitting across the table, and said imperiously, “Qui est ce jeune homme?” Jacqueline explained that he was a brilliant Harvard professor who now ran the National Security Council staff. De Gaulle, with a stately inclination of his head, said something about Harvard to Bundy in elaborately slow French, as if to someone not likely to understand the language. When Bundy responded in easy and fluent French, the Americans felt: Score one for our side.
After luncheon the two Presidents resumed their talk. Kennedy returned to the problem of how to convince the Russians that the west was in earnest. The existing allied military plans, based on the assumption of very limited Russian probes, seemed to him inadequate. What if the Russians sent in not a company but a brigade or a division? Or what if they undertook a series of steps, none of which by itself constituted a sufficient provocation but all of which together would destroy our position? We must make our policy clear by action, Kennedy said, and Khrushchev must understand that, if necessary, we would go to nuclear war. De Gaulle, responding, put special emphasis on preparing for a new western airlift; after all, there could be no ambiguity when a plane was shot down. He also noted that Russia needed western trade and might be vulnerable to economic retaliation. The western position in Berlin, he said, was not so weak as people thought.
Kennedy turned the conversation to Laos. De Gaulle observed that the countries of Southeast Asia did not offer a good terrain for western troops, nor indeed for western politics. Unlike India and Japan, which were “real” nations, these were “fictitious” nations, and neutralization was the best solution. The French experience had been that exerting influence in Southeast Asia and taking military action there were almost incompatible. As for Laos, de Gaulle strongly supported the idea of a neutral coalition under Souvanna Phouma. In no case would the French dream of military intervention; but, when Kennedy argued that the threat of western intervention might be necessary to bring the communists to an agreement, de Gaulle said that he would not oppose the United States publicly. They talked for a moment about the tension between Peking and Moscow. Kennedy expressed doubts that the split would become acute until the west was forced out of the area; the rivalry between Caesar and Pompey, he recalled, came into the open only after they subdued their common enemies. Then they touched briefly on Africa, and de Gaulle reaffirmed French opposition to UN operations in the Congo.
As they prepared to break up, de Gaulle paused, charmingly cited the prerogatives of age and ventured to suggest that the President not pay too much attention to his advisers or give too much respect to the policies he had inherited. In the last analysis, the General said, what counted for every man was himself and his own judgment. He was expounding, of course, the Gaullist philosophy of leadership. His counsel, after the Bay of Pigs, fell on receptive ears.
More ceremony followed—meetings with the diplomatic corps, a visit to the Arc de Triomphe, a state dinner at the Elysée, with treatment for the ailing back in between. Malraux was at the Elysée, white and taut; his sons had been killed in an automobile crash a few days before. Mrs. Kennedy was deeply moved at his appearance, and an enduring friendship began. The Parisians cheered the President, but it was now apparent that, as much as they liked him, it was his wife whom they adored. Her softly glowing beauty, her mastery of the language, her passion for the arts, her perfection of style—all were conquering the skeptical city. This was a good deal more than the instinctive French response to a charming woman. It had the air of a startled rediscovery of America as a new society, young and cosmopolitan and sophisticated, capable of aspiring to the leadership of the civilized peoples.
The next morning the talks resumed. Latin America de Gaulle freely acknowledged as a primary American responsibility, but he asserted that common cultural ties gave France a particular access and role; Kennedy said he welcomed French contributions to Latin American development. They returned to Africa, dealing particularly with Angola, where Portugal was clinging to rigid colonial policies in the face of the native demand for self-government. De Gaulle agreed that the Portuguese attitude was inflexible and obsolescent; but pushing Salazar too hard, he said, might cause a revolution in Portugal and establish a communist state in the Iberian peninsula. Kennedy replied that change in Africa was inexorable and the attempt to block it would only benefit the communists. The United States therefore had determined to take a progressive position on Angola in the UN. De Gaulle agreed to encourage Salazar toward more constructive policies and said that, while he could not support the American position, he would not oppose it.
After luncheon on June 1 Kennedy moved into trickier country and raised the problem of NATO. De Gaulle in a flow of felicitous exposition said that NATO was two things: an alliance and an organization. No one questioned the need for the alliance, but the organization in its present form had outlived its time. Its essence had been the defense of Europe by American nuclear weapons; its occasion, the weakness of the Western European states; its result, the integration under American leadership of European contributions to the American defense of Europe. But the world had changed. Washington no longer possessed its nuclear monopoly, and this fact reduced the value of the American nuclear sword. Moreover, America had commitments in all parts of the world. And in Europe the re
vival of national pride, especially in France, meant that integrated defense under American command was no longer acceptable. The recent revolt of French generals against their government, de Gaulle said, was perhaps a result of the denationalization of defense; the generals, feeling no responsibility for the protection of France, felt no loyalty to the government of France. And the absence of national defense, he argued, weakened the alliance because only national motives could rally the full support of a population in a prolonged war. While France would do nothing to disrupt the existing organization during the Berlin crisis, the President must understand that it sought a different organization for the future. Since no one could be confident any longer that the United States would use nuclear weapons first, the future security of Europe had to be assured by European countries, not without the United States but not exclusively through the United States.
Kennedy responded with equal bluntness. For the United States, he said, the defense of Europe and of America was the same. American troops were stationed in Europe to remind Moscow that an attack on Europe automatically constituted an attack on America. If the Soviet Union threatened to overrun Western Europe, the United States was prepared to respond with nuclear weapons. The advantages were so great to the side which used nuclear weapons first, Kennedy emphasized, that the United States could not afford to hold back its nuclear arm even if the Russians used only conventional forces. If the European states built separate defense establishments, he added, this would create new problems; those states which had no nuclear weapons would be forced toward resentment and neutralism.
De Gaulle commented that all this would be fine if the Russians really believed that America would use its nuclear weapons in defense of other states; but he doubted whether Moscow did; he even doubted whether the Americans believed it. No state could be expected to place atomic weapons at the disposal of another state. That is why he did not ask the United States for atomic weapons or even for assistance in developing French atomic power. The United States, in his judgment, would use nuclear weapons only when its own territory was directly threatened; and why not? This was the way states behaved. France or Russia would do no differently. If Kennedy said that Americans regarded Europe and the United States as the same, “since you say so, Mr. President, I believe you,” but could anyone be really certain? If he sat in Kennedy’s place, de Gaulle said, he would not be certain himself when or where he intended to use these weapons. After all, had not the United States already raised the threshold—that is, postponed the point at which nuclear weapons were scheduled to come into play?
Kennedy explained that raising the threshold meant only making sure that local clashes would not lead to nuclear war; it meant not a decrease in commitment but an increase in control. Obviously any attack which challenged NATO would rise above the threshold. The General must understand that the United States, though isolationist as late as the Second World War, had changed. The American response to aggression in Korea should reassure our allies. Only as we strengthened confidence among ourselves could we convince Moscow that we would stand firm in Berlin.
At this point they adjourned; and that evening de Gaulle threw a dazzling dinner in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles. Jacqueline, fresh from a fascinating day with Malraux at the Jeu de Paume and Malmaison, glittered in a Givenchy gown. As they walked to the Louis XV theater for a ballet performance, passing down the long hall filled with statuary, Kennedy stopped and inquired about one statue. Malraux, impressed, asked the interpreter to tell the President that he had picked the only one that was not a fake.
During dinner Kennedy talked to de Gaulle about Churchill and Roosevelt. Churchill, the General said, was a fighter, casual in manner, extremely interesting some days, totally impossible others. His policy was short-run, designed to meet immediate problems. Like all Englishmen he was a merchant, bargaining, for example, with Russia, prepared to make concessions in the east in return for a free hand elsewhere. Roosevelt, on the other hand, was always charming, always the aristocrat. He had a long-run policy but was often mistaken in that policy, as about the Soviet Union. Kennedy wondered whom de Gaulle preferred. The General replied that he had quarreled violently and bitterly with Churchill but always felt a basic accord with him. He had never quarreled openly with Roosevelt but never felt a moment of rapport.
On Friday morning, June 2, Kennedy and de Gaulle, still alone with their interpreters, held their fifth meeting. Kennedy, feeling de Gaulle out some more on the alliance, mentioned the possibility of giving NATO increased control of nuclear weapons—for example, releasing Polaris submarines to NATO countries under an arrangement which would place the decision for their use in an authority to be determined by the United States, Britain and France. Would not such an arrangement remove doubts about American readiness to act? De Gaulle replied that nuclear weapons, even if nominally under NATO control, would be in fact under American control—which was natural enough and nothing for which America could be reproached. But such nominal transfer would not constitute the defense of Europe by Europeans, nor would it answer the question: when would nuclear weapons be used? The need therefore remained for Europe to organize its own defense, in association with the United States, of course, but under its own responsibility. Kennedy reiterated his assurance that either a massive conventional attack or the threat of a nuclear attack would produce a nuclear strike against the Soviet Union. De Gaulle remained dubious. Perhaps the situation would never be clear enough; remember that Hitler took over Europe bit by bit.
Later in the morning de Gaulle and Kennedy joined their advisers in a larger meeting. De Gaulle summed up the talks with customary elegance. At the end he said how pleased he had been to meet the President and to perceive his great future—a future which he himself could not share since he would soon be yielding the reins of power to younger men. He believed that he and the President might be taking dramatic actions together, but of course no one could know exactly what might lie ahead. The atmosphere of the talks had been excellent; never had the common destinies of the two nations been closer. The Franco-American alliance was fundamental to France; all the rest was machinery. Kennedy responded that his most vivid impression of France had been not even the magnificence of Versailles but the force and vitality of the French people.
The President now went off to a luncheon for the press, introducing himself: “I am the man who accompanied Jacqueline Kennedy to Paris, and I have enjoyed it.” He gave a frank appraisal of the changing shape of problems in Europe. The policies of the late forties, he said, were no longer “adequate” for the circumstances of the sixties. “All of the power relationships in the world have changed in the last fifteen years, and therefore our policies must take these changes into account.” Europe had grown in strength and unity. America had lost its nuclear monopoly and had become “vulnerable to attack”; this had reinforced our view that “your defense and ours is indivisible.” And, because of the extraordinary rebirth of Europe, the struggle had switched to the southern half of the planet, where the threat was “not from massive land armies but from subversion, insurrection and despair”; the time had therefore come for a “concerted attack on poverty, injustice and oppression” in the developing world.
In asides intended for Vienna, he affirmed “strong hopes” for a test ban agreement in Geneva and a cease-fire in Laos. He was going to Vienna, above all, he said, so that he and Khrushchev could understand each other’s purposes and interests and therefore avoid the “serious miscalculations” which had produced the earlier wars of the century. In the questioning which followed, someone asked what he would think if he were in Khrushchev’s place. He replied that, if he had lived Khrushchev’s life, he conceivably would draw Khrushchev’s conclusion that communism had the momentum of historical inevitability; but that he himself took “a somewhat different view of the tide of history.”
In the afternoon he met alone with de Gaulle for a final talk. Kennedy first proposed the consideration of mechanisms of consultation,
both political and military, among France, Britain and the United States. De Gaulle agreed, suggesting that the matter might be discussed after the German elections. They then talked about the question of British membership in the Common Market, which Kennedy had told Macmillan he would raise in Paris. The President noted that, while the Common Market would create economic problems for the United States, he believed that it would greatly strengthen Europe, politically as well as economically, and that for this reason its advantages, even to America, far outweighed its drawbacks. To realize the maximum benefit he hoped that Britain would become a member. De Gaulle’s response was reserved though dispassionate. He expressed doubt whether Britain really wanted full membership; the British, he said, always preferred the role of brokers. They could have the Commonwealth preference system or the Common Market but not both. In any case the door was open; but, as for himself, he thought British membership should be full or none.
The two men parted on this slightly inauspicious note. The conversations had nevertheless been candid and searching, and both were pleased with them. The meeting was of course pervaded by the contrast between the imperturbable nationalist, serenely certain that the classical state was the permanent and irreducible unit of international life, conducting a policy of national grandeur and expecting other leaders, if they had any sense, to do likewise; and the reasoned pragmatist, convinced that the world was changing and forever interested in testing out new patterns and possibilities. But the philosophical clash was muted. In 1961 each man was primarily concerned with exploring the mind of the other; and in any case, so long as the Algerian war lasted, de Gaulle was not free to pursue, or even to disclose, his designs for Europe. The talks turned up no insuperable obstacles to cooperation and perhaps left the General with a momentary hope that he was on the verge of achieving the aims he had been seeking since he had proposed a Franco-Anglo-American directorate in 1958: the recognition of France as the spokesman for continental Europe, the establishment of mechanisms for joint political and strategic planning, even possibly a French veto over the use of American nuclear weapons. The General had begun with a benignly avuncular attitude toward a young man not even born until Captain de Gaulle had fought three years on the western front in the First World War. The French leader came away with the impression of the American President as un homme sérieux, fully aware of the weight of the responsibilities he had accepted and fully capable of meeting them.
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