I shall take this opportunity to fulfil from this rostrum on behalf of the USSR delegation the pleasant task of greeting the freedom-loving people of France, who have for the second time so hospitably welcomed our General Assembly to their country.
2. The United Nations is faced at this moment with a number of important problems requiring the particular attention not only of the General Assembly but of all peace-loving nations. The USSR delegation is fully aware of this and is conscious of the responsibility which rests on the United Nations for the course which it will take in resolving these problems and fulfilling these tasks.
3. The USSR delegation now, as at previous sessions, realizes that it is its duty to direct the General Assembly’s efforts to removing all obstacles that stand in the way of strengthening world peace and international co-operation in an attempt to remove the threat of a new world war.
4. This is at present the most important and urgent task and requires immediate action by the United Nations. We are convinced that there is no other problem the solution of which is awaited so eagerly by millions and millions of people, indeed by the entire peace-loving world.
5. This task is the more important because the international situation has further deteriorated, both economically and politically, since the General Assembly’s sixth session.
6. The economic situation in the capitalist countries has further deteriorated during this time as a direct result of the aggressive policy of the Atlantic bloc, led by the United States of America, and of a number of other countries forced to follow this policy under constant pressure from the United States.
7. The economy of the United States itself has become unstable as a result of war inflation. It is marked by a steady increase in the production of armaments and simultaneous retrenchment in the civilian branches of industry. The armaments race has inevitably resulted in an increase in military budgets and direct and indirect taxation, which has led to a further deterioration in the material situation of those countries. It must be pointed out that the policy of economic discrimination, primarily in trade relations, against the Soviet Union and the countries of the people’s democracies plays no small part in worsening the international economic situation ; this policy has seriously harmed the economy of the world, the economy of the United States, and, to an even greater extent, that of the United Kingdom and France. Many of the prominent leaders of these countries have been forced to admit that the economic situation in the capitalist countries has seriously deteriorated.
8. As to the United States, such an admission was made recently by Mr. Truman in his economic report to Congress for the first half of 1951 in which he said that inflation in the United States of America has led during the past year to an increase in the price of essential consumer goods. I shall quote further from this report: “It has encouraged speculation and has made things more difficult for a large part of our people” — that is, the American people. Those, continued Mr. Truman, who have been fortunate enough to increase their incomes have been able to maintain their standard of living. But more than half the families in the country have been unable to increase their incomes between the beginning of 1950 and the beginning of 1951. Indeed the incomes of nearly a fifth of the aggregate number of families have actually decreased.
9. Mr. Truman in his broadcast address last night again had to concede — a point which Mr. Acheson today confirmed from this rostrum — that there is a close connexion between raising the standard of living of the population and decreasing the armaments burden. However, it is common knowledge that this realization does not prevent the Government of the United States of America from pursuing the mad arms race, thus bringing about a further deterioration in the material condition of its people.
10. The economic position of the countries of Western Europe, and in particular of England and France, may be judged from the conclusions contained in the report of a United Nations economic commission — not the statements of any mere propaganda paper but the conclusions set out in the report of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe, and quoted in the 1 September number of the British periodical New Statesman and Nation, as follows : “The economy of the United Kingdom is showing every sign of suffering from severe strain. Cost inflation is rampant, and towards the end of the year may well be enhanced by demand inflation flowing from the heaviest rearmament programme in Europe.”
11. Economically and in particular financially, both Great Britain and other Western European countries are now threatened, and will continue to be threatened by serious difficulties, especially in view of the new United States law, which the President signed only a few days ago, 26 October. According to this law I am trying to keep as closely as possible to the actual wording — it will be United States policy to impose an embargo on all goods exported to the Soviet Union and countries friendly to the Soviet Union and to discontinue economic and financial aid to all countries trading with those countries.
12. While on this subject I cannot refrain from mentioning an article which appeared in the April 1951 number of the American periodical Foreign Affairs, written by the present Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom, Mr. Eden, who is now here as head of the United Kingdom delegation. That article contained the following passage, to which I think it is important to draw attention now. Mr. Eden was at that time, it is true, in the Opposition, but I do not imagine he has changed his views, at any rate on this point, as a result of becoming a member of the Government, Mr. Eden wrote, “ it must be remembered that the British economy is already fully stretched, with a higher level of taxation than any other country in the world ”.
13. Nor can I deny myself the pleasure of referring to another even more explicit statement on the same subject, made by the new British Prime Minister in outlining his programme to the House of Commons. In his speech, as reported in the official Press, Mr. Churchill used the following words: “As regards the general balance of payments of foreign trade, we are in the midst of a crisis. For the deficit is larger than in 1949 and in many respects even worse than in 1947. In the present half-year”, said Mr. Churchill, after the speech from the Throne, “we are running into an external deficit at the rate of £ 700 million sterling a year compared with an annual rate of surplus of about £ 350 million sterling in the same period a year ago”.
14. “In 1952”, said Mr. Churchill, “the latest estimates show that unless the situation deteriorates, the United Kingdom will have a deficit on its general balance of payments of between £ 500 million sterling and £ 600 million sterling”. Unless, Mr. Churchill said, the situation deteriorates. But what guarantee is there that it will not in fact deteriorate?
15. The exhaustion of the central gold and dollar reserves in the transactions of the sterling area as a whole would increase this deficit considerably. The conclusion? Mr. Churchill has drawn this conclusion: “These figures mean”, he said “that we are buying much more than we can afford from current earnings”. The new law, signed by the President of the United States of America on 26 October will of course make the situation even worse.
16. “That”, concluded Mr. Churchill, “may lead in time to national bankruptcy”. Such is the present economic situation of Great Britain, one of the leading members of the Atlantic bloc, a country which is also engaged in a mad arms race.
17. Even more serious is the economic plight of the underdeveloped countries, most of them Asian countries, which, as a result of the militarization of the United States of America, the United Kingdom and a number of other States, are unable to obtain the equipment they require for developing their own industries. The proceeds from the sale of their raw materials are frozen in American and British banks, and they cannot dispose of them freely. Agriculture in these countries is on the decline, and holds out no promise of progress in the future. The production of foodstuffs is falling, and the populations of a number of areas are doomed to famine, disease and extinction.
18. The political situation too has deteriorated during the past year. The aggressive Anglo-American Atlantic bloc as led to a further worsening of international relations, already sorely strained by the atmosphere of unbridled war hysteria, the armaments race, and the constant attempts to frighten other nations by the threat of atomic and hydrogen bombs, for which the American reactionary leaders are responsible.
19. For almost a year and a half the United States of America and Great Britain, the leaders of the Atlantic bloc, have been waging an aggressive war in Korea. Mr. Acheson today made an attempt to shift the responsibility for the war from the government of the United States to other countries, although, as was proved over and over again in the course of the fifth session, it was in fact the United States of America which really launched the aggressive, predatory war in Korea. If it proves necessary to do so, we shall be prepared to marshall all this evidence again at the sixth session. There is, I think, no need to dwell at length on that point at the moment.
20. As regards the Kaesong negotiations, to which Mr. Acheson also referred today, there can surely be no doubt about the fact that it is the American generals — the MacArthurs and the Ridgways and their protectors — who have persistently sabotaged all attempts from the other side to achieve success in these talks. Is it not, after all, the American command which has been undermining the success of these negotiations by using various delaying tactics, bombing neutral zones, and adopting other similar typically American methods of negotiation? Can there be any doubt that the truce talks in Korea could be brought to a successful conclusion by a very simple process? The American Government need merely instruct General Ridgway not to complicate the situation by all kinds of incidents; not to set up artificial obstacles designed to prejudice the success of the Kaesong talks; not, for instance, to put forward proposals such as the one reported over the radio today, an utterly ridiculous demand to the effect that the Kaesong area should be taken over by the American command, quite regardless of the fact that the area is at present in the hands of the North Korean forces. With an approach such as this, can there be any hope of successful talks? And who, in these circumstances, must be held responsible for their breakdown? Really honest people can obviously give only one answer : those who invaded Korea, who spilled the blood of the Korean people, who subjected the Korean people to untold misery and suffering, r who are breaking all the laws and regulations of international law by bombing civilian centres, including even neutral zones. That is where the responsibility for the Korean war lies.
21. The United States has seized the Chinese island of Taiwan, and is threatening the borders of China. Now it is trying to strengthen the North Atlantic bloc by the inclusion of Greece, Turkey and Western Germany, which have been assigned a special role in its aggressive plans against the Soviet Union. The members of the Atlantic bloc are thus openly flaunting international agreements which were signed during the war against hitlerite Germany and militarist Japan with the object of preventing a repetition of fascist aggression and strengthening the bonds of friendship with the Soviet Union. In this way, the bosses of the North Atlantic bloc are rushing to pave the way for carrying out the aggressive plans worked out in the offices of the general staffs at the order of reactionaries in the United States of America who are thirsting for another world war. And, in order to deceive the public, in order to mask their true aggressive aims, the President, members of the Cabinet, Senators and other political and social leaders in the United States are raising a hue and cry about the security of the United States being threatened by the Soviet Union.
22. They are trying to twist the recent atom bomb tests in the Soviet Union to serve this purpose; tests of different sizes of such bombs, according to a reply made by Generalissimo Stalin, President of the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union, to a Pravda correspondent in connexion with the atomic weapon, are to be carried out as part of the plan for the defence of our country against attack by the aggressive Anglo-American bloc.
23. In his reply to the Pravda correspondent Generalissimo Stalin exposed the complete groundlessness of such apprehensions and showed them to be without foundation.
24. “The rulers of the United States”, said Generalissimo Stalin, “must be aware that the Soviet Union is not only opposed to any use of the atomic weapon, but recommends its prohibition and the discontinuance of its production. If the United States does not intend to attack the Soviet Union the fears of its rulers are spurious and unfounded, since the Soviet Union has no intention of attacking the United States of America or any other country at any time ”.
25. The Atlantic bloc has based its hostile policy towards the Soviet Union and the people’s democracies, under pressure in these cases chiefly from the United States of America, in an endeavour to make a tool of the United Nations and to push through the General Assembly and other United Nations organs resolutions invalidating decisions, designed to remove the threat of a new war and to maintain international peace and security, which had been adopted at previous sessions of the Assembly. Such resolutions were in fact taken at earlier sessions of the Assembly. But they have not been acted on. At the fifth session of the General Assembly, the Soviet Union delegation declared that the Assembly was thereby violating the fundamental principles of the United Nations. Our delegation called for the adoption of proposals submitted by the Soviet Union and the people’s democracies to strengthen peace and to prohibit — not reduce, as Mr. Truman and Mr. Acheson would have it — I repeat, completely and unconditionally to prohibit the atomic weapon, proposals for the use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes only, and for the prohibition of war propaganda. At the same time we called upon the Assembly to adopt resolutions for the immediate cessation of the war in Korea, which had been forced upon the Korean people by the Anglo-American interventionists, for the cessation of aggressive action against the People’s Republic of China and. on a number of other important subjects.
26. Unfortunately, the General Assembly did not adopt that course. On the contrary, it embarked on further departures from and violations of the purposes and principles of the United Nations. At the last session a number of resolutions were adopted, the aggressive character of which are beyond dispute, notwithstanding all the attempts of their authors and instigators to disguise their real object beneath fine phrases such, as “uniting for peace”, and “peace through deeds”, to quote two of the bloc’s resolutions. The Assembly resolutions on the so-called collective measures, those establishing a blockade and putting an embargo on goods exported to China, the iniquitous resolution declaring the People’s Republic of China an aggressor, and the equally iniquitous resolution charging the American Command in Korea to ensure “conditions of stability”, in the words of the resolution, throughout the whole of Korea, or in other words to continue the aggressive war until the whole of Korea had been conquered, speak for themselves and show the aggressive character of the policy pursued by the General Assembly at its last session under United States pressure. The Assembly openly embarked on a policy of supporting and intensifying aggression against the peace-loving peoples of Korea and China.
27. Shortly before this sixth session the majority in the Security Council, at the instigation of the United States and England, committed a new violation of the most important principles of the United Nations Charter by accepting for consideration the British complaint against Iran, in clear violation of Article 2, paragraph 7, of the Charter which, as you are aware, forbids intervention in the domestic affairs of States. Thus once again the Anglo-American group in the United Nations demonstrated its complete contempt for the most important principles of the Charter, which require respect for the independence and sovereign rights of States.
28. It is only necessary for me to mention these facts to remove any doubt that the elementary principles and standards of international law are being trampled underfoot in the United Nations, and that American policy is doing immeasurable damage to the moral authority of our Organization.
29. Instead of performing the important tasks of helping to establish the requisite conditions for peaceful and friendly relations between nations, of promoting a better standard of life, of securing full employment, the Economic and Social Council, at its last session, devoted itself entirely to the preparation of measures supporting the Anglo-American aggression in Korea. During its eleventh session the majority in the Council adopted at the instigation of the United States, a resolution for the so-called “relief and rehabilitation” of Korea. It should be quite clear to all and sundry that the purpose of this resolution was to provide a hypocritical and lying cloak for the barbaric destruction of Korean towns and villages and the slaughter of the peaceful Korean people by American aircraft.
30. The Economic and Social Council took the same line at its twelfth session and did everything it could to support American aggressive policy also in the economic sphere. The majority in the Council at the same time systematically rejected any proposals for the development of a peaceful economy and the satisfaction of civilian needs. The Council rejected a proposal recommending steps to decrease war industry, to reduce prices of articles of mass consumption, to decrease the people’s burden of taxation, to increase expenditure on housing, health, education and the like. In a word, it rejected any proposal submitted by those who were really attempting to improve the physical, economic and social condition of the people in many countries. All such proposals were rejected root and branch.
31. In the regional economic commissions, which dealt with matters chiefly affecting Asian countries, the Anglo-American bloc rejected a number of important constructive proposals by the USSR delegation and the delegations of the people’s democracies for promoting the development of economic relations in the countries and territories of Asia and the Far East and for promoting the development of national industry in those countries and territories, together with a number of other important proposals.
32. These facts are well known to you all. It was before your very eyes and unhappily, I must point out, it was with the support of many of you that all these decisions were taken, decisions designed to defeat the attempt to strengthen universal peace and prosperity, and to create a war psychosis which would facilitate the preparations for a new war that are being secretly made by the American military staff.
33. In this way, year by year, step by step, the United Nations has been departing more and more from the purposes and principles of the Charter, from the tasks set before the United Nations by its Charter and its founders. The United Nations has strayed far from the path of strengthening peace and promoting the development of friendly relations between countries and peoples. To-day, it is being guided by different interests; it is being pushed towards different goals by aggressive forces in the United States, England, France and the Latin-American countries, which now manage the questions of war and peace in the United Nations. And it is these goals and interests, this craving for a new war, for riches from war, for gigantic profits from war, which is the source of encouragement of the master monopolists who, as generalissimo Stalin, the head of the Soviet Government, remarked, “ consider war a money-making proposition providing colossal profits ”, Nor can this be concealed by deceitful and hypocritical phrases about peace, about “ peace through deeds ”, and “ uniting for peace ” — phrases, the spurious character of which is being demonstrated every day, every hour, every minute, by numerous facts.
34. The aggressive tendencies and plans of the American monopolists are fully supported by a number of States, members of the North Atlantic bloc, which hold a commanding position in the United Nations, and are converting it from an instrument of peace into a tool of war.
35. “By becoming an instrument of aggressive war”, said Generalissimo Stalin, “the United Nations is ceasing to be an international organization of nations with equal rights. The United Nations is now substantially not so much an international organization as an organization for Americans, acting to satisfy the requirements of the American aggressors”,
36. Such are the facts and facts, as we know, are stubborn things. But we must not go further along this path.
37. It is time to remind the United Nations of its duties, which are: to support not the aggressors who attack other countries, but those who are subjected to attacks by aggressors; to support international peace and security; and to develop friendly relations between nations. It is time to rebuff the aggressive forces which are pushing the world toward a new world war.
38. What is happening m the United Nations is a direct result of the foreign policy of the Anglo-American bloc, which constitutes the aggressive cone within the United Nations.
39. Influential government leaders in the United States — the President, members of the Cabinet, Senators — day after day instigate hostility towards the Soviet Union and the countries of the people’s democracies. The United States Congress piles act upon act aimed at destroying the peaceful co-operation between our peoples, at kindling a new world war.
40. Only this year the United States Government, proceeding along the path of further worsening relations with the Soviet Union, adopted an act to embargo trade with the Soviet Union and the countries of the peoples democracies and broke the USSR-United States trade agreement of 4 August 1937, which had hitherto operated quite soundly.
41. We cannot fail to note that this decision to break the United States-USSR trade agreement was adopted in the United States almost simultaneously with the appeal of the United States President, Mr. Truman, and the United States Congress to the Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Mr. Schvernik, and to the Supreme Soviet of our country, an appeal which contained assurances of the desire to improve relations with the Soviet Union. It must be frankly said that such declarations are not in harmony with the actions of the United States Government and in particular with the breaking of the aforementioned trade agreement with the USSR, which can only be evaluated as an act designed to bring about a further deterioration of relations between the USSR and the United States.
42. The aggressive character of the foreign policy of the United States is obvious to the whole world, in spite of the efforts of the United States Government to conceal it from world public opinion by representing the new war which it is preparing as a defensive war and representing the peaceful policy of the Soviet Union and other peace-loving countries as an aggressive policy, although everyone knows that the Soviet Union, as I already said in quoting , the authoritative statements of Generalissimo Stalin, has no intention of ever attacking the United States or any other country.
43. Meanwhile, year after year, the United States has been increasing its army, navy and air force, has been building hundreds of new naval and air bases on foreign territory, has been creating a whole system of military alliances, involving in those alliances even the former “ axis ” countries — so well experienced in such matters — Japan and Italy, and also Western Germany.
44. The whole economy of the United States of America, as well as of England, France and a number of other countries, has been geared to war production. The lion's share of expenditures in their State budgets goes for war preparations. Military expenditures in the United States budget for 1951-52 amount by official American figures to £ 81,800 million, a sum which is seventy-six times greater that what was appropriated in 1939.
45. As Mr. Truman admitted in his message to Congress in April of this year, the United States had over the preceding ten months more than doubled the number of its armed forces and is planning in the course of the next fiscal year to increase them further to 3,500,000 men, not including 2 million men in other military units and in the National Guard. The number of the armed forces of the United States, England and France is thus already several times greater than in 1939, in the period before the Second World War, and is more than double the number of the armed forces and armaments of the Soviet Union. Nevertheless, the armed forces of these countries and their expenditures are being increased more and more.
46. The United States is continuing to expand its military industry, which is swallowing up more and more thousands of millions of dollars, under the pretext of the “defence” and “national security” of the United States.
47. American ruling circles are trying to picture the armaments race, the forming of a large number of armies, the production of atomic bombs, the creation of military bases on foreign soil, as a necessity resulting from an alleged danger from the Soviet Union threatening England, the United States and France.
48. Aiming at a similar deception of the peoples in regard to the real character of the policy of the Atlantic bloc is also the declaration — I learned about it last evening — of France, England and the United States presented yesterday to the General Assembly. From this declaration, in spite of the words it contains about peace, the conclusion may clearly be drawn that these States will continue the armaments race, the production of atomic bombs, the barbarous aggressive war in Korea, once again on the pretext of defence interests and the alleged desire to protect the security of their countries. They thereby seek to prove that peace can be preserved only on the basis of a powerful war-machine, by force, and that only under such conditions can the well-known existing political disagreements between various countries be settled.
49. Here, I would recall, is a basic thesis of American total diplomacy, exhibited once again today by Mr. Acheson, repeating yesterday’s radio speech by Mr. Truman. Once again they boast of successes in the armaments race, in the expansion of the so-called combined defence forces in Europe under the command of General Eisenhower, and promise future expansion and increase of those armed forces and armaments, as Mr. Truman declared, in Europe and in other parts of the world just as long as that is necessary. It is obvious that all these measures are planned on a long-term basis. At the same time they are all screened with spurious phrases about an alleged threat from the Soviet Union ; but this is a repetition of the slander against the policy of the Soviet Union in order to deceive their own peoples, in order to drag them into a new world war organized by the ruling circles of the United States of America. How many times have they tried to resort to the same deception in order to strengthen their own position in the eyes of public opinion and to continue the line of their aggressive policy.
50. All that we heard today from Mr. Acheson is an expression of that same policy of situations of strength, the utter recklessness of which is now evident to every clear-thinking person, in spite of all the artifices employed by the instigators of the plan for another world war to deceive unsophisticated people. But this total diplomacy has already proved its complete bankruptcy. And if now a proposal on peace is introduced and words about peace are jumbled together, this has only been done under the pressure of a powerful movement of the popular masses, who are demanding peace and who have put more than 500 million signatures to a new appeal on the necessity of concluding a pact of peace.
51. Is this the source of your love of peace, organizers and inspirers of the Atlantic bloc warmongers? Now your only course is to try to conceal even more effectively your aggressive plans by false phrases of peace; you need to reconquer the trust of the peoples in order to hoodwink them. That, however, cannot always be carried off successfully. Even in the United States this theory of “strength” no longer carries its former weight. Among large numbers of people in the United States dissatisfaction with the policy of “situations of strength” is expressed with increasing frequency and insistence. In all probability these voices reach even the State Department, although the ears of the responsible persons there are tightly stuffed with cotton-wool. For example, the view is expressed that if the United States stubbornly refuses to conduct negotiations, and insists on rearmament at an increasingly furious rate, the consequences will be disastrous not only for the United States, but for its allies too.
52. The basis of the entire United States foreign policy is in fact the preparation of a new world war, with the object of winning world hegemony for the American monopolies and extracting gigantic war profits. In recent times the United States, the United Kingdom and France have been exerting fresh efforts to extend the conspiracy against peace, and to draw Western Germany, Italy, Turkey and Greece into the preparation of the new war.
53. It is no secret that the United States is the chief organiser and inspirer of measures such as the “Pleven Plan ” and the “ Schumann Plan ”, the general objective of which is to restore German militarism and the military-industrial power of Western Germany, and to use the German regular army and the German economy for aggressive ends.
54. That is why the United States and the United Kingdom and France, which indisputably follow in the wake of the United States, broke off the Paris meeting of the Deputy Foreign Ministers on the German question. Mr. Acheson’s attempts to whitewash the boycott policy of the United States and its allies during the three months marking-time at the Paris meeting of Deputy Foreign Ministers on the German question are no avail.
55. The facts speak against Mr. Acheson. The facts speak against such attempts. The facts show that in this instance once again it was the Anglo-American bloc which did everything in its power to break off the meeting of Deputy Foreign Ministers on the German question, and in fact succeeded in doing so.
56. Last September, having wrecked the Paris meeting of Deputy Foreign Ministers, Mr. Acheson and his adherents organized their own meeting in Washington and then held a meeting of the Council of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in Ottawa, endeavouring to intensify and extend the remilitarization of West Germany, to go still further in transforming Western Germany into a base for aggression against its neighbours.
57. For some years since the end of the Second World War — as also before it — rivers of American gold have been flowing into German war industry, with the object of forcing that industry into the service of the American monopolists, who thirst for ever greater profits even at a cost of disastrous calamities and sacrifices to all humanity.
58. The objectives of United States policy towards Japan were demonstrated beyond need of words in the farce staged at San Francisco by the United States for the signing of the so-called Peace Treaty with Japan. That Treaty is quite incompatible with the principles on which a genuine peace treaty might be constructed, a treaty calculated to ensure peace in the Far East and provide guarantees against any recurrence of Japanese aggression. Not only the United States Government, but the Governments of the United Kingdom, France, Canada, Australia and a number of other States which signed the San Francisco Treaty, violated the obligations which they assumed in 1947 as members of the Far Eastern Commission, With their participation, the Commission adopted resolutions stating that the above-mentioned Powers undertook to carry out reforms in Japan with the object of destroying the influence of militarism and ensuring the complete disarmament of Japan, thereby rendering it impossible for that country to wage aggressive war in the future.
59. Instead of fulfilling these obligations, the initiators and inspirers of the “peace treaty” with Japan resorted to a policy of reviving Japanese military organizations of all kinds and establishing and expanding military, air and naval bases in japan ; of restoring the Japanese army, fleet and air force ; of strengthening Japan as an American military arsenal and war base in the Far East.
60. Such a “peace treaty” with Japan is incompatible with the interests of the peace-loving peoples and with those of the Japanese people themselves. By compelling Japan to enter a war bloc directed against the USSR and the People’s Republic of China, it condemns the Japanese people to the bitter fate of serving as cannon-fodder in the new war under preparation by the aggressive Atlantic bloc. This is a dangerous development in international relations; a step which undermines the peace and security of the peoples of the Far East. It is dangerous, moreover, because the San Francisco Treaty provides for the continuance of the occupation of Japan by United States forces even after the signing of the Treaty, and lays upon Japan the obligation of offering its territory for American war bases. It is obvious that the San Francisco Treaty is not a peace treaty, but a treaty for the preparation of a new war in the Far East.
61. The San Francisco Treaty makes it more difficult for the Japanese people to secure the democratization of their country and develop the peace economy of Japan. It will lead to the transformation of Japan into a country dependent on foreign monopolies, will make it impossible for the Japanese people to develop their welfare and will impede the development of their material and spiritual forces.
62. This, however, was not the object of the inspirers of the treaty — the Anglo-American monopolists. They needed the treaty solely in order to legalize their way to a military alliance between the American monopolists and the Japanese militarists. Such a treaty cannot and will not serve the cause of peace. Rejected by the USSR and by the People’s Republic of China, India and Burma — the countries most interested in a peaceful settlement with Japan — the peace treaty signed at San Francisco will remain a dead letter.
63. The basis of present United States policy is fear of any possibility of a peaceful development of international relations or the strengthening of international co-operation.
64. In American “ business ” circles it is openly admitted that fear of the “ peace danger ” reigns supreme ; that share prices rise on the American stock exchange — as has been reported on many occasions in the American Press — when the continuance of the Korean war appears probable, and fall, on the contrary, whenever there appears any likelihood of the conclusion of peace in Korea.
65. Having started a war of aggression in Korea which is earning them huge profits, the American billionaires and millionaires are tenaciously clinging to this source of gain and are in no mood to let such a “golden opportunity” of multiplying their millions and billions slip out of their hands. They view with alarm every hint of the likelihood of an armistice in Korea, and are doing everything possible to thwart the conversations in Kaesong, despite the fact that the American people — in common, we are profoundly convinced, with all peace-loving peoples — are longing for and demanding the termination of the war and the establishment of peace in the Far East.
66. The July issue of the bulletin published by the American National City Bank of New York, which is well-known to be under the control of the influential Morgan group, frankly states that any reduction in expenditure on armaments will make the situation of the monopolists a difficult one.
67. The President of the United States, Mr. Truman, stated at one of his many Press conferences that an armistice in Korea may lead to delay in the fulfilment of the American armament programme, which, to quote his words as reported in the Press, “would be the most catastrophic thing that could possibly happen in the United States”.
68. Another president, Mr. Rubin, who is the president of the powerful investment company Selected American Shares Incorporated, frankly asserted at a bankers’ conference in Los Angeles that “ if peace is achieved, it is difficult to imagine what will take the place of the defence programme as a support of our economy ”.
69. Thus, two presidents, equally authoritative, have stated their views in favour of war.
70. It is for this reason that the USSR proposal for a ceasefire in Korea created serious alarm in the governing circles of the United States. In order to exert appropriate pressure on American public opinion, Mr. Wilson, director of the United States office of so-called defense mobilization stated in a radio broadcast on 9 July 1951 that the Soviet proposal for cease-fire in Korea was a manoeuvre undertaken for the purpose of “ weakening the vigilance of the United States and obstructing the fulfilment of the country’s defence programme ”. That is his description of the military programmes for the implementation of American aggressive plans. Furthermore, Mr. Wilson expressed his conviction that the United States Congress would not embark on so dangerous a path. The path of peace, in Mr. Wilson’s eyes, is a dangerous one.
71. Are not all these facts sufficient to confirm the fact that the trend of American foreign policy is aggressive, and that its purpose is not to support peace but to unleash a new world war, whatever the cost to mankind in new bloodshed and disaster?
72. The foreign policy of the USSR is a policy of peace. The Soviet Union is waging a ceaseless struggle against the menace of war, a struggle for peace, for the strengthening of friendly relations among the peoples, for close international co-operation based on mutual respect for the independence of nations and for the sovereign equality of States.
73. When, nearly twenty years ago, diplomatic relations were established between the Soviet Union and the United States of America, Generalissimo Stalin characterised that event as one of momentous importance. It was important politically, he said, because it improved the chances of preserving peace, and economically because it brushed aside secondary considerations and made it possible for the two countries to discuss questions of common interest on a business-like footing. Lastly, it paved the way towards mutual co-operation.
74. These words were uttered twenty years ago, when diplomatic relations were established between the Soviet Union and the United States for the first time. But these words are of the greatest importance, and do not apply alone to the United States.
75. These words of the leader of the Soviet people reflect the fundamental principles of Soviet foreign policy, the policy applied by the Soviet Government in its relations with all other nations. The Soviet Union steadfastly adheres to these principles, which have determined every course and every step taken by the Soviet Government in international affairs.
76. In the pursuit of its peace policy, the Soviet Union is utilizing its entire resources, not in order to expand its armed forces or to conduct an armaments race, not to expand its war industry or to organize military bases on foreign territory, but in order to expand to the full its civilian industry and develop the national economy as a whole.
77. The successful reconstruction and development of the postwar economy have enabled the Soviet Union to tackle gigantic projects; projects, I maintain with full justification, such as have never before been undertaken by any other single country in the history of mankind. There is the project for the extensive multi-purpose exploitation of the Volga, Don, Dnieper and Amu-Darya rivers, designed to satisfy the requirement of the national economy in regard to power, agriculture, transport et cetera. The huge construction projects already undertaken by the Soviet Union, such as the hydro-electric plants at kuibyshev, Stalingrad and elsewhere and the Grand Turkmen, Southern Ukrainian and other canals, are also well-known. The new electric power plants will yield a daily output of 22,000 million kilowatt hours of cheap electric power, which, as L. P. Berya, Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers, has pointed out, is equal to the entire annual output of electric power in Italy. The new irrigation projects will permit the irrigation and reclamation of over 25 million hectares of land, an expanse equal to the entire area of several European States. The purpose of these huge projects, in the construction of which the Soviet Union is investing thousands of millions of roubles, is to promote the development of the peaceful economy of the country and to enhance the welfare of its people.
78. In the Soviet Union the entire population is engaged in creative work, is directing all its efforts towards the development of the national economy and is achieving success after success in the continued promotion of culture, technique, science and art. In its political relations with other countries, the Soviet Union has always stood and still stands for friendly co-operation and is opposed to any discrimination, and to all artificial barriers preventing the free inter-course of the Soviet people with others. The Soviet Union has always stood and still stands for friendship among the peoples.
79. Ever since the General Assembly began its activities, the Soviet Union has, year by year, advocated the adoption of measures to strengthen peace and international security. Sufficient it is in this connexion to recall that as early as 1946 the Soviet Union submitted a proposal for a general reduction of armaments and for the prohibition of the production and use of atomic energy for warlike purposes. Notwithstanding the resistance of the Anglo-American bloc to these proposals, the General Assembly, as you will remember, substantially accepted [63 rd meeting] these Soviet Union proposals. Throughout the subsequent period, unfortunately, the Anglo-American bloc has hampered, in every way possible, their implementation.
80. At subsequent sessions, from 1947 to 1950, the Soviet Union has steadfastly demanded the prohibition of atomic weapons; not their reduction I would stress, as in the proposal just submitted by the United States of America, but their complete prohibition. However, the Soviet Union has encountered constant resistance from the powers of the North Atlantic bloc.
81. The Soviet Union has also repeatedly advocated the establishment of strict international control, in order to ensure the meticulous and conscientious fulfilment of decisions on the prohibition of atomic weapons and the use of atomic energy exclusively for civilian requirements. But here also the aggressive North Atlantic bloc has constantly wrecked the Soviet Union’s proposals for international control — as indeed occurred again today — and has put forward its own proposals, which have in fact nothing to do with genuine international control. I refer to the notorious Acheson-Baruch-Lilienthal plan, which is no more than a mockery of international control and which no self-respecting State, genuinely desirous of preventing the leakage of atomic energy for military purposes could ever accept. For what Messrs. Acheson, Baruch and Lilienthal propose is not an international but an American control organ, designed to legalize and sanction the production of atomic weapons, and not to supervise the implementation of decisions to prohibit the production of atomic weapons, as proposed by the Soviet Union and as demanded by millions and millions of people and by all the peace-loving nations of the world.
82. In the light of these facts the true worth of the outcry raised in the United States and certain other member countries of the North Atlantic bloc over the atom bomb tests in the Soviet Union will be clear to all. Particularly vociferous have been certain members of United States ruling circles who make no secret of their plans to use the atom bomb against the Soviet Union and who view with equanimity even so infamous and cynical an expression of their devotion to the atom bomb as the article which has just appeared in one of the latest numbers of Collier's Magazine, accompanied by disgusting illustrations. These gentlemen clamour at the fact that an atom bomb — and indeed more than one — has been manufactured in the Soviet Union. However, they are not willing to adopt our proposal, which is to prohibit the atom bomb, to destroy atom bombs or even to use those bombs already manufactured, as generalissimo Stalin has said, for civilian purposes — which is entirely feasible. Most noisily of all, these gentlemen sow slanderous rumours to the effect that the Soviet Union is against international control over the execution of the decision to prohibit atomic weapons, and that the United States on the other hand is in favour of such control. In reality, however, the reverse is the case : it is in fact the Soviet Union which has always striven and still strives for the establishment of effective international control over the observance by all States without exception of measures to prohibit atomic weapons ; prohibition here meaning unconditional and unqualified prohibition. Let Mr. Acheson answer: is he in favour of the prohibition of atomic weapons with control, or of control without any prohibition of atomic weapons, as is stated in the documents which he has here read out? However, we shall have more to say about this in the First Committee and I shall reserve further comment for the future. I need hardly say that we welcome such further discussion.
83. Since they are in favour of atomic weapons the United States ruling classes desire neither the unconditional prohibition of the production of atomic weapons nor genuine international control. As J. V. Stalin stated in his reply to a Pravda correspondent on the subject of atomic weapons, what they really want is the legalization of the right of the warmongers to use atomic weapons for the destruction of tens and hundreds of thousands of peaceful human beings.
84. At the fourth and fifth sessions of the General Assembly the Soviet Union submitted a proposal for the conclusion by the United States, the United Kingdom, China, France and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics of a pact for the strengthening of peace. More than 500 million people throughout the globe warmly supported this proposal. They still continue to support it steadfastly, since this proposal inspires great hopes for the removal of the threat of a new war and for the strengthening of peace.
85. At the present time particularly energetic efforts are required to achieve a solution of this problem and to lead the world out of the dangerous situation into which it is being drawn by the criminal machinations of the instigators of a new war.
86. In view of the situation which has arisen in international relations the leaders of the aggressive North Atlantic bloc have been obliged to come forward with their plan for reducing the danger of war, as they allege, and increasing the security of all nations. This plan was the subject of the so-called three-power declaration by the United States of America, France and the United Kingdom to which I have already referred, and also of yesterday’s broadcast speech by President Truman and today's speech from this platform by Mr. Acheson. In spite of all the impressive publicity which preceded these three declarations it may be stated without fear of error, in the words of a Russian and, I believe, an English proverb, that "the mountain has brought forth a mouse”, I will amend this only by saying that it has brought forth a still-born mouse; so frivolous and so manifestly specious are the peace proposals emanating from the North Atlantic camp.
87. What, in actual fact, do they propose as the most radical method, they claim, of removing the threat of a new war and strengthening peace? From a perusal of yesterday’s speech by Mr. Truman and from today’s statement by Mr. Acheson, it would appear that they propose the undertaking of a census or inventory of armed forces and armaments under the supervision of a new joint commission for atomic energy and conventional armaments. Is this not absurd? Of course, stock-taking is a useful procedure in every economy. Inventories must be made of boots, great-coats, bayonets, cartridges, rifles, machine guns, et cetera — all this needs to be checked over. But is this a task for the United Nations in the struggle for peace? For Mr. Acheson it is the main task, and yesterday Mr. Truman resoundingly proclaimed to the whole world that without the solution of this problem there can be no reduction of armaments and no peaceful settlement of outstanding questions.
88. After reading this speech I could not get to sleep all last night — because I was choking with laughter. I am not by nature given to laughter, but even on this platform — although, as the President will attest, I am refraining from laughter — I am unable to restrain my irony over this sensational peace offensive by which the United States delegation hoped to wrest the initiative from the Soviet Union, I trust they will accept our congratulations.
89. As long ago as 1948 we were asked to undertake the collection of information on armed forces and armaments. We are now being asked to undertake a census of all armed forces and armaments, and the supervision of this census. In accordance with its outcome, concrete measures for reducing armaments are to be elaborated. On the basis of this census it is suggested that we determine what weapons and armed forces each country shall have the right to maintain now and in the future. With regard to so critical a weapon as the atom bomb, the sponsors of the proposals limit themselves to a publicity campaign in favour of the notorious Acheson-Baruch-Lilienthal plan, claiming that it is the most suitable. But the complete worthlessness of this plan was exposed by the United States representatives themselves; if necessary, I can quote documents stating that this control plan in actual fact controls nothing, that this guarantee plan guarantees nothing; that it is in short a plan which, in the words of a commission under the chairmanship of Mr. Acheson himself, in its report of its findings to the United States Government, entirely passes over the question of prohibiting the production of atomic bombs, since the whole matter is subject to the discretion of the Senate, which will act in accordance with its own prerogatives and the appropriate legislation. I quoted this report at the last session and I do not intend to abuse your patience by going further into the matter now. I will only say that it has been proved up to the hilt that the Acheson-Baruch-Lilienthal plan is utterly worthless: it provides no control whatever because, since there is no prohibition, there is nothing to control; it provides no guarantees because, since it is not an international plan, it is in no position to give them. Yet this plan is now officially presented to us as the very latest innovation in United States peace policy for 1951. But this same plan is modestly silent as to the necessity of prohibiting the atom bomb.
90. Neither Mr. Truman, nor Mr. Acheson, nor the three-power declaration, propose to lift a finger to prohibit the manufacture of atomic bombs. They cravenly shy away from the subject and pretend that a mere reference to last year’s General Assembly resolution, which referred in passing to the prohibition of atom bombs but in no way indicated the necessity of prohibiting them, will settle the whole affair, and that all nations will continue to thrive, awaiting the moment when that very same bomb bursts over their heads.
91. Moreover, the President of the United States and his Secretary of State, as is clear from their respective speeches of yesterday and today, continue to insist that the most suitable plan for controlling the use of atomic energy is precisely the one which is clearly a mere mockery of all international control.
92. Is it necessary to state that all such plans, and all proposals of the kind contained in the three-power declaration and advocated here by the United States representative, though they may be submitted in the form of peace proposals and with the avowed objective of strengthening peace and removing the threat of a new war, are in actual fact nothing but sheer speculation on either the ignorance or the naivety of people seized with fear for their own future and that of their children.
93. The sponsors of these proposals stated yesterday and today, with their customary lack of ceremony, that they insist — this phrase, please note, is used in speaking to the Soviet Union — that they “insist” that the Kremlin accept their proposals. Is this all you wish to insist on, gentlemen? They will insist on the Soviet Union’s accepting these proposals, and at the same time they make slanderous allegations about the Iron Curtain and such nonsense which should have been dropped long ago and placed, where it belongs, in the archives of the State Department.
94. But what are these proposals worth? Instead of dealing with the vitally important and serious matter of making a real effort to avert the threat of another world war and ensure the security of the peoples, they attempt to evade that issue by empty chatter purporting to deal with the reduction of armaments, the first stage in which process — and no one knows how many years that stage may last — being devoted to the rearmament of States.
95. It is difficult to see what value can be attached to this whole scheme, as outlined in the so-called tripartite declaration, because, in submitting their proposals for a so-called reduction of armaments, the authors of the proposals declare that as long as the Korean war continues, as we were told by the President of the United States of America yesterday and again by Mr. Acheson today, “ and while the major political issues that divide the nations remain unsettled ”, — I am quoting from the relevant part of the speech made by the President of the United States yesterday — “real progress toward reducing armaments may not be possible”.
96. This remark is characteristic. It clearly reveals the true meaning of the so-called three-power peace offensive led by the United States of America at the sixth session of the General Assembly in 1951. That offensive is supposed to open a new era in the fight for peace, but in fact it has nothing to do with peace or the strengthening of peace.
97. If the purpose really is to strengthen peace, any sincere plan for the reduction of armed forces and armaments must be based on an equally sincere attempt to put an immediate end to the war in Korea. The United States, however, is unwilling to take any steps to end the Korean war, as this would be against the wishes of the American multimillionaires, who are growing rich on this war, on war hysteria and on the armaments race.
98. Mr. Acheson saw fit to repeat the slander — I will refrain from using a harsher word out of deference to this Assembly, but no doubt you will all be able to provide a suitable epithet — about the infringement of human rights in, he said, a “ large ” area of the world, referring in this connexion to Hungary and Czechoslovakia. I shall not dwell on this matter particularly since these slanderous inventions spread about in Mr. Acheson’s camp have already been repeatedly and fully refuted.
99. But Mr. Acheson speaks of the infringement of human rights in other countries. I too would like to refer to what I read in a French evening paper about a revolting crime recently committed in Florida. Two negroes, Leon Shepherd and Walter Irving, had been convicted by an American Court of the traditional crime of raping a white woman. They were later acquitted and set free by the United States Supreme Court because of the many and varied irregularities which had occurred during their trial. After their acquittal by the United States Supreme Court these unfortunate negroes were openly shot by the sheriff of Eustace, Florida, and a third negro was shot in the sheriff’s presence by a policeman.
100. This is apparently what human rights mean in America; this is apparently the meaning of the American Way of life, which we so firmly reject and which we would advise you to look into more closely. We would counsel you to pay greater attention to these matters in your own country, in the vicinity of your own noses, so to speak, and to keep those noses out of other people’s countries.
101. It is essential that the manufacture of atomic weapons should be prohibited without delay and that a strict international control should be set up to see that this prohibition is obeyed, so that atomic energy and the existing stocks of atomic bombs could be used solely and exclusively for civilian purposes.
102. It is essential for nations to end the armaments race, stop the setting up of military bases in foreign territories, and finally, withdraw all their troops from foreign territories.
103. It is further essential that every State should take immediate steps to reduce its armed forces and armaments and to divert its funds from military budgets to satisfying the needs of the peoples, improving their material condition and safeguarding their welfare.
104. It is essential that the United States, the United Kingdom, France, China and the Soviet Union should at last make a concerted effort to conclude among themselves a peace pact, such as the one we have been striving for four years, a fact which all peace-loving peoples should be asked to join. Action along these lines would frustrate the aggressive plans of the ruling circles in the United States, the United Kingdom and certain other countries, and would remove the threat of another world war.
105. The delegation of the Soviet Union, acting on its Government’s instructions, is submitting proposals which it firmly believes will be an important means of attaining the purpose which millions and millions of people throughout the world dream of and for which they live and toil.
106. The USSR delegation is convinced that the struggle for peace will end in a complete victory for peace. “Peace”, as Generalissimo Stalin has said, “will be preserved and fortified if the peoples take the matter of preserving it into their own hands and if they defend its cause to the end”. We believe that the General Assembly should listen to the voice of the peoples and fulfil its duty in this great and noble cause.
107. On its Government’s instructions, and with a view to strengthening the peace and security of the peoples and averting the threat of another world war, the USSR delegation submits the following proposal for the consideration of the General Assembly [A/1944] : 1. The General Assembly declares participation in the aggressive Atlantic bloc and the creation by certain States, and primarily by the United States of America, of military, naval and air bases in foreign territory incompatible with membership of the United Nations. “ 2. The General Assembly recognizes it to be essential that: “ (a) The countries taking part in the Korean war should immediately end military operations, conclude a truce and withdraw their forces from the 38th Parallel within a period of ten days ; “ (b) All foreign troops, and also foreign volunteer forces, should be withdrawn from Korea within a period of three months. “ 3. The General Assembly calls upon the governments of all States, both those which are Members of the United Nations and those which are not at present in the United Nations, to consider at a World Conference the question of a substantial reduction of armed forces and armaments and also the question of practical measures for prohibiting the atomic weapon and establishing international control over the observance of such prohibition. “The General Assembly recommends that the above mentioned World Conference should be convened at the earliest possible date and in any case not later than 1 June 1952. “4. The General Assembly calls upon the United States of America, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, France, China and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to conclude a peace pact and to combine their efforts for achieving this high and noble aim. “The General Assembly also calls upon all other peace-loving States to join in the Peace Pact.”
108. The Soviet Union Government believes that the adoption of these proposals, some of which have been submitted previously by the USSR delegation for the General Assembly’s consideration, would play an important part in maintaining peace throughout the world.
109. The USSR delegation calls on all the representatives present here to support these proposals, which it firmly believes will be welcomed by all nations striving for peace and by all peace-loving peoples.
38. I had never imagined that any representative, whether of a great or a small State, could have been placed in so humiliating a position as that in which the Australian representative has tried to place me, nor that any such attempt could have been made towards any representative enjoying equality of rights in our Organization. We have, of course, become used to all kinds of infamous proceedings, including police measures and police cross-examination, but I don’t submit to the latter. It is humiliating to the Assembly — I am not referring to the personal humiliation, inflicted on me — to reply to the question of the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs, who has apparently not mastered the elementary rules of courtesy which prevail in international gatherings.
39. I must point out that I did not reach the rostrum at which I now stand by some devious way, but through the legitimate method of putting my name down two days ago to speak, again in accordance with rule 74 of the rules of procedure, and in the knowledge that neither the rules of procedure, nor the Charter upon which those rules are based, contain provisions depriving any delegation of the right to speak twice on any question. Thus the way I have chosen is the usual, constitutional way and no one is entitled to prevent me from speaking again in accordance with rule 74. I would ask the President to be guided by rule 74 as well as by rule 69. It is argued that in such circumstances the plenary meeting might turn into an endless “long parliament”. But that depends on the members and on the President. If anybody wants to answer my statement, the President must permit him to reply under rule 74. Some representatives will probably desire to do so, the Australian representative himself, for instance. I am not going to ask him now what he intends to say; I have enough patience to wait a while and hear him.
40. It is suggested, if you please, that no objection would be raised if I had anything unusual to say. I might of course retort by asking the leader of the Australian delegation, who is also the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs, to tell me what he regards as unusual. I might answer his question by another; but assuming that the question is put in a friendly way my reply is that what I intended to say will be unusual from his point of view and entirely usual from mine. The Australian representative pointed out that this is a democratic assembly. But his speech proves that his position at least has nothing whatsoever to do with democracy.
41. To conclude these explanations, I would, with respect, ask the President to allow me to speak on the substance of the matter without wasting any more precious time in empty prattle and in a slanging match with the Australian delegation. By his leave I will now speak on the substance of the matter.
42. During the general debate which has now reached its closing stages, many representatives have touched on a series of extremely important questions arising mainly from the statements and proposals of the United States, United Kingdom and French delegations on the one hand and of the delegation of the Soviet Union on the other. Although considerable attention has already been paid to those proposals, not all the questions have been sufficiently clarified; they cannot therefore be regarded as exhausted.
43. We have already pointed out that these proposals of the three Powers [A/1943], submitted in their much advertised plan for the reduction of armed forces and armaments, including atomic weapons, and allegedly aimed at reducing the danger of war and strengthening the security of all countries, by their very nature do not conform to the advertisement. A careful analysis of the tripartite statement containing these proposals is enough to convince us that this is so.
44. In my first appearance here [336th meeting] I was not able, of course, to subject that statement to the thorough analysis it fully deserved. I confined myself then to a few passing remarks, and shall not conceal the fact that I also informed the Assembly that the statement had made me laugh. But more of that later, if at all.
45. Take, for example, such an extremely important matter as the prohibition of atomic weapons; it turns out that the statement does not provide for the prohibition of atomic weapons at all. This is utterly unacceptable. It is certainly no accident that the tripartite statement, in paragraph 5, merely mentions casually that the basis “for the atomic energy aspects of any general programme for the regulation, limitation and balanced reduction of all armaments and armed forces” should continue to be the so-called “United Nations plan for the international control of atomic energy and the prohibition of atomic weapons”. But we all know that this so-called plan for the control of atomic energy and prohibition of atomic weapons, which has already been imposed upon a majority of the States Members of the United Nations by the United States, although it may speak of international control of atomic energy and of achieving the prohibition of atomic weapons through such control, in reality contains neither international control nor prohibition of atomic weapons.
46. Have we already forgotten that as long ago as 1946 the United States Committee on Atomic Energy — the Chairman of which was the present Secretary of State of the United States of America, Mr. Acheson, whom I am pleased to see among us — in a report prepared with the assistance of its Board of Consultants, headed by Mr. Lilienthal, one of the authors of the “Baruch Plan”, and composed of such prominent specialists in the production of atomic weapons as Barnard, Oppenheimer, Thomas and others, pointed out in referring to this so-called international control plan, which the tripartite statement now cites, that the plan did not require the United States to discontinue the production of atomic weapons even after the international control plan had been put into effect? Is that a fact or is it not?
47. Up till now I have received no reply to this question. Such eloquent members of the United States delegation as Mr. Austin, who, as we know, replies to any question with a wide variety of objections, have hitherto given no answer. Perhaps they will answer this time, if only under rule 74. I will gladly make room for them on this rostrum, which I shall not occupy forever.
48. Perhaps they will reply to the question as to the meaning of the letter, signed four or five years ago by Mr. Acheson, to the then Secretary of State, Mr. Byrnes, in which it was stated that even after the so-called international control plan had been put into effect the United States would by no means be obliged to discontinue production of atomic weapons, but that everything would still depend on ratification, on discussion of political conditions, on the international situation, which the Senate would be bound to take into account when it finally decided the question along with the House of Representatives.
49. Thus the plan which is now cited by the tripartite statement not only does not provide for prohibition of the production of atomic weapons but, on the contrary, stipulates that the United States may continue to produce atomic weapons after the international control plan goes into effect. This is one of the characteristic features of the Baruch Plan. Another is that it provides for the kind of international control system for atomic energy that must inevitably lead to the unlimited power of American monopolists, who would thereby become masters of the whole world’s economy, including the resources of atomic energy. Thus this plan is not a plan for international control but for American control, which bears no relation to the objectives of a genuine international control organ. In the terse expression of the head of the USSR Government, Stalin, it is a take-off, a travesty of international control.
50. Note that this plan, which is supposed to be a plan for the international control of prohibition of the atomic weapon — notice this point particularly — not only fails to provide for prohibition of the atomic weapon, but provides — and this in my opinion is monstrous — that the international control organ, responsible for ensuring that the future decision prohibiting the atomic weapon is correctly, honestly and conscientiously carried out, the very organ created for that purpose, should possess a research department of its own which would deal, as is stated in various American documents, with the development and use of the atomic weapon. It is enough to make a cat laugh! An international control organ is to be set up to ensure that no one should be able to produce the atomic weapon; and provision is made for that control organ to include a special research institution for the further study of the possibilities of further developing the atomic weapon!
51. That is the plan which, according to the tripartite statement, is to serve as the basis for that part of the general programme for the reduction of armaments which concerns atomic weapons. Naturally the Soviet Union was and still is unable to agree to a plan which instead of prohibiting atomic armaments, legalizes the production and use of those barbaric weapons for mass slaughter. The plan is entirely unsatisfactory and cannot be accepted by any sensible person who really wishes to solve the problem and really stands for prohibition of the use of atomic energy for military purposes and for its use exclusively for peaceful purposes. Nevertheless, the plan is praised to the skies here by Mr. Acheson and Mr. Eden, who are attempting to win us over by advancing, among their other proposals, one for the inclusion of atomic weapons in the same “system of disclosure and verification” as conventional armaments. Mr. Eden calls this an advance with respect to atomic armaments, and says that had the three Powers made no other proposal their statement would nevertheless deserve study by the Assembly. Even for the wisest it is never too late to learn; the proverb contrasts “the light of learning with the darkness of ignorance”.
52. What is important, however, is not that certain proposals should be studied, but the content and value of those proposals; whether or not a real and absolutely necessary solution can be found to this serious, vital problem. And there can be no serious solution of the problem of atomic armaments without their unconditional prohibition, a subject which the United States of America, England and France persistently avoid in their statement. That is the fact.
53. The three Powers also propose in their statement that a resolution should be adopted concerning the provision of information on armaments, it being understood that this information would be furnished progressively, or, in the words of the statement, “ in successive stages Some people, including the last speaker, General Romulo, are enthusiastic about this proposal. I do not share his feelings, though I know him to be a very enthusiastic man and not very difficult to inspire with enthusiasm; to command his enthusiasm a proposal has merely to originate in the United States of America. We are used to that and must of course expect it. An enthusiastic man like General Romulo can be enthusiastic even about this proposal. But what, in reality, is this system of successive stages? I should, with your permission, like to go into that.
54. Mr. Acheson said — I should mention here that I am using a Russian translation: it is possible that in places it may not quite tally with some other Russian translation, and differ from the English text in some trifle of a comma or quotation mark; but in the main it is clearly accurate since it is the work of responsible translators. I am using: the text of the official translators of the General Assembly, whose work is well known to be excellent. At any rate the delegation of the Soviet Union has no complaint to make against their translations; it finds them indeed highly satisfactory. I repeat, Mr, Acheson said [335th meeting] that “this system of disclosure and verification must be a system which progresses”. That is the first principle: it progresses. “Which progresses from stage to stage as each one is completed”: that is the second principle. “The least vital information”, he continued, “would be disclosed first”. Where did General Romulo get the idea, which made him so enthusiastic, that notifying, reporting and providing information concerning atomic armaments would begin immediately? Nobody said anything about that. On the contrary, Mr. Romulo, I must disappoint you and ask you to approach the study of this statement more carefully and without enthusiasm.
55. “ The least vital information ”, said Mr. Acheson, “ would be disclosed first, and we would then proceed”; here Mr. Acheson used a remarkably apt expression — you will observe that I can speak of him not only harshly and rudely, but also gently and kindly — “ to more sensitive areas”. The sensitive area, Mr. Representative of the Philippines, is ultimately atomic armaments, and the statement promises that we shall come to it later on. Even that would be all right if later on were not postponed to what the ancients called the Greek calends; you will remember that the calends only existed in the Roman calendar and never in the Greek.
56. This was confirmed by Mr. Eden in his speech of 12 November [339th meeting]. “We suggest”, he said, “that this should begin with the less important categories of armed forces and armaments”. Was I not right in saying that a start would be made with ordinary rifles, machine guns and so on, that is to say, with the less important weapons? That is what Mr. Eden said. I merely repeated it, though in doing so I evidently caused a certain person displeasure. Apparently one must not repeat what other people have said even when it is to the point; one must bring out something fresh, indeed unusual, as the Australian representative requested me to do today. Clearly he must be satisfied, as I am saying something really unusual. What I am saying now is probably absolutely new to him. And then, Mr. Eden said, that is to say, after going through the less important categories, we shall go on to the more important ones. He went on to explain what was meant by those more important categories. They are the more secret ones, and, consequently, he went on — another remarkable expression! — “more difficult to handle”. You see, when we reach the last, or some later stage, and it comes to the disclosure of secrets, then, says Mr. Eden, we come up against the need to disclose even things which are difficult to handle.
57. What are those things? Atomic bombs, perhaps hydrogen bombs, tactical or maybe non-tactical ones, I do not know; at any rate some special ones which Mr. Eden places in the more important categories, to use his own expression, or which, in the words of Mr. Acheson, constitute “more sensitive areas”. Those I believe are the delicate questions which the three Powers relegate to the last stage. We have not the slightest doubt that this cautious approach is due solely to the desire to avoid, in actual fact, providing any information on the atomic weapon, which of course belongs specifically to that most secret category which, according to Mr. Eden, is particularly difficult to handle. It is like, if one might say so, a very sensitive lady who must be handled with special care and tenderness, and never exposed to the public view.
58. Here is just where we see the real point of the system of successive stages devised by the three Powers. The actual shift from one stage to another will, according to Mr. Acheson’s and Mr. Eden’s statements, be made at the discretion of those who hold the mechanism controlling the reduction of atomic weapons and all armaments, as well as the prohibition of atomic armaments. Mr. Acheson underlined that “in a world charged as ours is with suspicions and dangers, our peoples want the safeguard that disclosure and verification can provide”. It is entirely understandable and a matter of elementary logic that if this is in fact so, then an effort must be made to disclose as soon as possible the most important features which give the best safeguard. But the tripartite statement turns the whole matter upside down, or, as the English and Americans are fond of saying, “puts the cart before the horse”; or as it seems the Australians and Canadians say, evidently preferring oxen to horses, “puts the cart before the ox”. Mr. Acheson says that safeguards are necessary and that only if such safeguards are forthcoming will transition from one stage to the next be possible. He states directly: “As we move from stage to stage, we would have increasing evidence of good faith and honesty. We would not go forward”, he adds, “without that evidence”. This way of stating the issue can only mean one thing: that the transition from one stage to the next in the submission of information on armaments under the three-Power plan will be made directly dependent on whether those States possessing the most powerful, dangerous and threatening weapons, on which information has to be published and made known at succeeding stages, will be prepared to accept as satisfactory the results of submitting the required information at the first stage. This can only mean that the fate of the whole plan for collecting data on armaments, for verifying these data and for implementing measures for the reduction of armaments will reside in the hands of the possessors of the more powerful and dangerous weapons. This, finally, may well mean that the decision as regards the transition from one stage to the next will be entirely up to those same Powers, which will decide in accordance with their interests. If they recognize that it is possible to make known the more secret and dangerous types and forms of armaments, they will accordingly do so, and will proceed to the ensuing stage; if they do not recognize this to be possible, they will not do so and will not transmit the information to anybody. Thus the whole affair will come to a standstill and stop at the preceding stage.
59. Naturally we cannot agree with this way of formulating the problem. A programme for the reduction of armaments in general, based on this principle, would be just as unacceptable as the similar system of stages underlying the Baruch Plan for the control of atomic weapons. This “ system of stages ”, in the hands of the masters of the situation, which the United States of America aspires to be, would constitute a convenient means of refusing for an indefinitely long period to carry out inconvenient and, from their own point of view, embarrassing control measures, or of implementing these measures unilaterally with respect to others States.
60. The system of stages in the Baruch Plan for so-called international control was intended to confine such control to the first stage in the production of atomic energy, that is, to subject to control only the extraction of raw materials, including uranium and others, and to prevent the extension of international control to the subsequent stages of production of atomic weapons. Under the conditions existing when the United States held the monopoly of atomic weapons, this system of stages, elaborated in the Baruch-Acheson-Lilienthal Plan, admirably suited the United States in atomic matters, for it placed under control only those engaged in extracting raw materials for atomic weapons, and freed from all control those engaged in the actual production of atomic weapons. An attempt is being made to apply this system even now, although the United States has lost its former monopoly of production of atomic weapons and so should realize by now that what is convenient for a monopolist is no longer convenient for him when he stops being a monopolist. The United States should know that it must find new paths to the solution of this problem and not repeat the same thing over and over again, like the magpie in our proverb which used to repeat the same things about everybody, no matter whom.
61. We have already said that all these proposals of the three Powers amount in substance to proposals for a census of armaments, which is to be carried out without any preliminary resolution for the reduction of armaments and before prohibition of atomic weapons, and which is designed to drown the main issue of the reduction of armaments and the prohibition of atomic weapons in a flood of words. This, however, is the main issue. Until the Assembly passes two resolutions on these two supremely important questions, anything else will have no practical significance whatsoever and will remain empty verbiage.
62. That is why we are urging that the Assembly should not shelve this matter but should resolve to prohibit atomic weapons, to establish strict international control to ensure that this prohibition is conscientiously and honestly observed and to reduce all other types of armaments. This resolution must be adopted and duly registered in the miracle book of the General Assembly. Afterwards it will be easy to agree on the important practical measures. But until this is done, alas! we shall be unable to move from our present position owing to a number of circumstances about which I, with your permission and if the Australian representative has no objection, shall have to speak further.
63. I must state that, of course, as soon as resolutions are passed for the reduction of armaments and for the prohibition of atomic weapons by all States — I stress this, by all States — information on armaments must be furnished as soon as possible.
64. As long ago as the first session of the General Assembly, in New York in December 1946,” the Soviet Union submitted a proposal to recognize the necessity for all States Members of the United States to furnish information on all their armed forces and armaments. The tripartite proposal, however, does not refer at all to military bases. It is of course impossible to ignore military bases in any reference to armaments and armed forces; for, when a military base is situated on foreign territory it is one of the ways of using armaments and armed forces which constitutes the greatest danger to peace. But, gentlemen of the American delegation here present, that is precisely the matter which we are discussing.
65. The tripartite proposal does not refer at all to military bases. You know, even under the strongest microscope you won’t find a trace of them, no trace at all of military bases on foreign territory. But in the meanwhile these bases are being established month after month by the organizers of the aggressive Atlantic bloc, although they do not mention the fact, and although the issue of the reduction of armaments and the prohibition of atomic weapons is closely connected with it. They cannot, however, be convinced of this.
66. This is an important issue, as the fact that the United States organizes military, naval, and air force bases in foreign territories constitutes one of the important measures in the preparation program for a new war. According to the incomplete and voluntarily reduced information published by the North American press, the United States has established 400 or more military, naval, and air force bases in the territory of foreign States. It is not necessary to underline the undeniable fact that the purpose of the North American bases is to encircle the USSR and the countries of people’s democracy, to the North with the help of the Scandinavian countries, to the South, with the help of Turkey and Greece, in the west with the help of the countries of western Europe, and at the east with the help of Japan, which now becomes a springboard for aggression, arsenal and strength of the Atlantic bloc, whose head point is directed against the USSR and the People's Republic of China. All kinds of maps, widely disseminated by the instigators of a new war, attest to this, indicating the direction of the attacks that must be launched, starting from these bases, against specific objectives, against the USSR, against the countries of popular democracies and China, that is, the People's Republic of China.
67. The role and destiny of the American bases stems from the statements made by Mr. Churchill - a person who speaks with full authority, as you know - according to which England has become the main atomic base of the United States. Mr. Churchill's statement shows that this main North American atomic base has been created, in accordance with the plan of the Atlantic block of aggression, for hostile purposes against the USSR. Read the speech delivered on November 9 by Mr. Churchill and you will see that I have not added nor taken away a single word of what he has said.
68. Despite the importance of the military bases of the different parts of the armed forces of the Atlantic block of aggression, nothing has been said neither in the tripartite statement, nor in the speech of Mr. Acheson - who has repeated the statements From Mr. Truman - not even in the intervention of Mr. Eden - who, in turn, repeated what Mr. Acheson had said - about the need to eliminate these military bases that are in foreign territory. This is where one of the most important causes of the tension in international relations can actually be seen, which, as is known, is far from mitigating.
69. In the statements by Messrs. Truman, Acheson and Eden, and in the tripartite statement, the proposals concerning measures related to the reduction of armaments are accompanied by a series of reservations. If you carefully read the speeches, documents and statements of those gentlemen, you always find certain reservations; it is clear that these reservations are intended to prevent practical steps from being taken to reduce arms and ban atomic weapons. This is the meaning that can be attributed to all of these reservations. I propose to quote some of them.
70. First, Mr. Truman, President of the United States, in his speech on November 8, included in his proposal on the reduction of armaments - which, as I have already mentioned, is reduced to a simple census of basic simpler weapons - a reserve; according to this, the proposed reduction of armaments cannot really be undertaken until there is an adequate international system, adding that, in order to reduce armaments, it was necessary above all to have an equitable and safe procedure. Mr. Truman did not bother to explain what he meant by this: a safe international system and a fair and safe procedure. Can it not be inferred from his speech that the United States will not be ready to implement the arms reduction program until this fair and safe international procedure has been developed? (I wonder if there is not a discreet allusion to the right of the veto in there, which apparently, would make both our Organization and its procedure unsafe. I think that this is precisely what he wanted to say.) Anyway, until is not elaborated, in accordance with Mr. Truman's proposals, a fair and safe procedure, and an adequate international organization, the United States will not be prepared to proceed with any armament reduction. Therefore, it would seem that the organization we currently have is not adequate for such objective; nonetheless, this does not prevent – as curious as it may seem - that the promoters of this plan for the reduction of armaments submit it to that same organization that does not seem adequate.
71. We also see that Mr. Acheson, in turn, has made the stepping from one stage to the other dependent on a condition that depends on the proofs of "good will" of such and such States. Messrs. Truman, Acheson and Eden have put as another precondition to the reduction of armaments, the elimination of the current international tension. As it is remembered, the politicians who deliberated in the sessions of the sadly remembered League of Nations, profited abundantly from this condition whenever it was a question about the reduction or even the prohibition of armaments, that is, of disarmament. It should be noted that it was precisely this circumstance that served as an argument after 1930 and particularly on the occasion of the fourth session of the Preparatory Commission for the Conference on Disarmament of the League of Nations, to a person we all know, Mr. Paul Boncour, then head of the French delegation, when he wanted to torpedo the concrete proposals regarding disarmament, then presented by the USSR delegation. He declared, and this formula has become somewhat classical: "Security first and then disarmament".
72. In the course of the preceding sessions of the General Assembly, opponents of arms reduction have only repeated this formula. Now it has just been modernized a bit by Messrs. Truman, Acheson and Eden, who have made the reduction of the current “international tension” a pre-condition for the reduction of armaments. But the hypocrisy shown by the United States in this regard stems from the fact that the entire policy of that country is intended to aggravate and not lessen the tension of international relations.
73. In fact, is this not the main objective of the attack by Tito's bullies in his slanderous and provocative denunciation against the USSR and the countries of popular democracy, which could never have been presented here if it had not been sponsored and even directly incited by the United States?
74. How could the representative of the failed Kuomintang regime been seen again during this period of sessions, at the General Assembly, and even worse, in the rostrum of the Assembly, which can be characterized by the French saying "The dead man takes over the living", if the silhouette of Mr. Acheson wouldn’t have been so clearly outlined behind Mr. Tsiang?
75. It is not a matter of isolated events here, it is sufficient to recall only the repeated attempts of the United States to sabotage the armistice negotiations, first in Kaesong and now in Pan Mun Chom!
76. Should we evoke the peace treaty with Japan, the division of Germany, the attempts made by the United States to re-establish or expand the bastions that they have installed on the borders of the USSR, North and South, East and West? Is it necessary to recall the story of the so-called defence of the Near East, which the United States is eager to defend without obtaining the consent of the Near Eastern countries?
77. With all his restraint, Mr. El-Khoury could not help pointing out that this bears a strong resemblance to preparations for American intervention in the Near East. I seem to have understood him correctly. At least, he is not correcting me now.
78. And what of the war in Egypt, which, as the Egyptian Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr. Salah-el-Din, has said, is now being waged against Egypt by a country purporting to be its ally? And what of this year’s events in Iran, of which Mr. Entezam has spoken?
79. Do these events not indicate the nature of the present policy of the United States and the United Kingdom towards economically and militarily weaker countries?
80. What about all the continuing excitement over the armament and rearmament of Europe, which are crippling a number of countries, including the United Kingdom, one of the chief promoters of that armament, as well as France which has also joined in?
81. And what about the excitement surrounding the nervous activities of the American staff of the Atlantic bloc, of which we are now spectators here? And the present, gathering in Paris of the leading figures of the aggressive Atlantic bloc, in which the United States Secretary of Defense, Mr. Lovett, is playing an active part, with General Bradley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Mr. Harriman, not to mention Mr. Acheson, Mr. Perkins or Mr. Adenauer, who is said to have arrived in Paris, or even. General Eisenhower, the Supreme Commander of the armed forces of the bloc, and the other persons engaged in preparing for the forthcoming session of the Council of the Atlantic bloc in Rome on 22 November?
82. Even the Paris Le Monde has not been able to conceal the real meaning and significance of all these facts. An article in the issue of, the day before yesterday, 14 November, entitled “From the Atlantic to the Rhine with the American Army” has a bearing on what I have said. I will quote only a few passages from this article.
83. First, Le Monde says: “At present more than ten thousand American soldiers and officers are in France. This time they have not come to pay their respects to Lafayette. Their assignment is [the following] the U.S, Army in the rear of its forces stationed in Germany is creating services and building up stores of food and munitions for use in the event of a conflict. This is the supply line, which is planned to run from the Atlantic ports to the Rhine... “English as you might hear it spoken near the banks of the Potomac or Lake Michigan is heard on a Saturday evening in the corridors of first-class coaches of the Limoges- Paris trains. With every week more American passengers get onto the trains in Chateauroux and Orleans. Many of them have put aside their khaki or air force blue uniforms for the week-end, but they all have military papers in their pockets... “Motor cars and lorries covered with dirty green tarpaulin impress the tourists more than the Packards and Chevrolets on the French roads. On their bumpers can be seen the letters E.C.C.Z., which signify ‘European Command Communication Zone’, since these vehicles form part of the fleet which the Americans are gradually building up in the rear of the occupation forces in Germany.”
84. Le Monde goes on to make the melancholy observation that these activities have no regard for the sovereignty of France.
85. But, however tolerant our attitude to these facts may be, are we not justified in saying clearly, firmly and resolutely that statements to the effect that the removal of international tension is the essential prerequisite for the reduction of armaments are absolutely insincere? Such statements do not accord with the facts I have quoted. They are contrary to the activities which characterize the whole foreign policy of the United States.
86. We cannot in fact daily and hourly create complications which lead to tension in international affairs while simultaneously making hypocritical appeals for the elimination of such complications. Deeds speak louder than words. Words are judged by deeds and no reliance is placed on them unless they are borne out by deeds. We are faced with a glaring contradiction between the juggling with words of the United States leaders, who are playing the chief part in the aggressive Atlantic bloc, and their deeds.
87. This contradiction fully exposes the hypocrisy and insincerity of the proposal made by the United States, the United Kingdom and France for the reduction of armaments, and shows it to be a screen for their real aims, and for the continued arms race and the preparations for a new war which those aims envisage. These reservations, these numerous other reservations scattered through the speeches of Mr. Truman, Mr. Acheson and Mr. Eden and in the tripartite statement can be regarded only as an attempt to prevent the adoption of practical steps for the reduction of armaments and the prohibition of atomic weapons.
88. The treatment of the Korean question by Mr. Truman, Mr. Acheson and Mr. Eden makes this particularly clear. They regard the end of the war in Korea as an essential prerequisite for the reduction of armaments. They have all clearly stated that no general programme for the reduction of armaments and armed forces can be carried into effect while the war in Korea continues.
89. But the United States should first apply that requirement to itself; to lay down such a condition is mere hypocrisy and deceit. The hypocrisy of the position on the reduction of armaments adopted by the United States Government and by the Governments of the United Kingdom and France is absolutely obvious, since the United States, the United Kingdom and France, with other governments of the member states of the Atlantic bloc, bear the full responsibility for the barbarous war forced on the Korean people, a fact which some representatives present here and speaking from this rostrum do not appear to understand.
90. It was the United States which started the war in Korea. It is for that country to bring this aggressive war against the Korean people to an end. For the Governments of the United States, the United Kingdom and France to put forward the demand for the termination of this war in Korea as an essential prerequisite for a so-called system of reduction of armaments can be regarded only as a mockery of the idea of peace, of the desire for peace of millions of people in all countries. This attitude of the United States proves, more clearly than any words that that country does not in reality desire any reduction in armaments.
91. The attitude of the USSR delegation to the question of reduction of armaments has been sufficiently clearly stated. It stresses the need to make a start with the reduction of armaments forthwith, whether the war in Korea is continued or ended.
92. We cannot agree with the statement made by Mr. Truman, and repeated by Mr. Eden and Mr. Acheson, that no what they term real progress towards the reduction of armaments is possible until the war in Korea has been ended or while, as Mr. Truman said, the political questions which at present divide the nations remain unsettled.
93. If the termination of the war in Korea really must be a preliminary condition of the reduction of armaments and the prohibition of the atomic weapon, why in that case are steps not taken to end the war immediately? Why in that case do General Ridgway and his associates at the Korean front in the extermination of the peace-loving population employ the most incredible chicanery to prolong the armistice negotiations themselves, as is apparent even from today’s papers? Why? Evidently because it is necessary to prolong the armistice negotiations in order to defer and delay the end of the war in Korea. And it is necessary to defer the end of the war in Korea in order to avoid reducing armaments and prohibiting atomic energy. The logic of such an attitude is sufficiently clear. But it is a vicious logic calculated to appeal to the simplicity and, I must be outspoken, the foolishness of credulous people. I do not think that any people of that kind are to be found amongst ourselves.
94. It is quite impossible to agree with Mr. Truman’s assertion that the end of the war in Korea is the essential condition precedent to the reduction of armaments. It is becoming quite obvious that in actual fact the tripartite proposal is nothing but a propaganda manoeuvre to enable the negotiations for the reduction of armaments to be used as a screen for the continuing armaments race conducted by the organizers of the Atlantic bloc.
95. It is no coincidence that even the American Press has been compelled to acknowledge that the so-called three- Power plan for the reduction of armaments, as described in the tripartite statement, was intended to serve purely propaganda purposes. I should like to refer to a number of organs of the American Press which have a large circulation and which in the view of many Americans are authoritative, for example, The New York Times,
96. On this matter The New York Times contains the open admission that one of the main reasons for the submission of the “disarmament” plan by the United States Government was that at the recent session of the Council of the Atlantic bloc at Ottawa the attitude of the European allies of the United States was marked by stubborn rebellion against the American plan of rearmament. We behind the Iron Curtain do not know what goes on there, it is all hidden from us; but, according to The New York Times, at that last meeting of the Council the attitude of the European allies of the United States was transformed into a stubborn resistance to the American rearmament plan.
97. The New York Times writes that western Europe is disturbed by the recent aggressive statements of American representatives.
98. The New York Times writes that this was just the reason why the United States had to stress its “peaceful intentions”. For these propagandist purposes, writes The New York Times, the American plan is good, but it will not serve as a means of bringing the cold war to an end.
99. The Washington Post, a newspaper which presumably is also well known to the United States delegation, states in its leading article that the “disarmament” proposal advanced by Mr. Acheson is only a “propaganda gesture”.
100. An article published on 9 November in the New York Herald Tribune affirms that the rejection of the western Powers’ plan by the Soviet Union will be used by those Powers in their campaign to shift the blame for the present armaments race on to the Soviet Union, and that this was precisely the purpose — this is the most important point — which American official representatives had in mind when they proceeded to elaborate their plans many weeks ago.
101. The New York Wall Street Journal called the American “ disarmament ” plan a chimera and a figment of the imagination, and went on to say that in selecting “ disarmament ” as a means of wresting the initiative from the Soviet Union the United States was really clutching at a straw, since the plan ignored reality for the sake of propaganda effect.
102. It is characteristic that The New York Times, asserting emphatically now that the primary task of the United Nations is to “elaborate” the western Powers’ plan for the purpose of displaying it to the whole world, at the same time affirms that the second task concerns the western Powers themselves, and is — according to The New York Times — to go full speed ahead with their rearmament programme.
103. What happens at Rome on 22 November will undoubtedly provide a rich illustration of the justice of this remark.
104. It is also impossible to ignore the statement by the American and a considerable part of the European Press that the tripartite proposal for the reduction of armaments was put forward because the idea of peace advanced by the Soviet Union, in conjunction with the part played by the Soviet Union as a champion of peace, has proved effective. The western Powers, as the New York Herald Tribune, for example, writes, have had to think in their turn of launching proposals for the reduction of armaments in order to win at least a propaganda battle at the General Assembly.
105. And was not this confirmed here by General Romulo, who declared in his speech that the United States had never introduced such proposals as on this occasion. Why were those proposals introduced precisely on this occasion?
106. The New York Herald Tribune, The New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and so on, replied to this question as follows: Because the rulers of the United States had to wrest the initiative from the Soviet Union and to make some kind of concession to their partners, who, according to The New York Times, had rebelled against the plan of the Atlantic bloc at the last meeting at Ottawa.
107. That is the situation so far as the so-called pence proposals of the three Powers are concerned. As we have seen, those proposals evade the main questions requiring immediate attention. These questions are the prohibition of the atomic weapon and the reduction of armaments. In those proposals an attempt is made to attach primary importance to secondary matters, and thus to divert the attention of the General Assembly from the main problems I have mentioned.
108. The delegation of the Soviet Union has already proposed to the General Assembly its positive programme of measures for averting the threat of a new war and guaranteeing the peace and security of the peoples. At the very beginning of our general debate we introduced our proposals [A/1944] on this matter under the following heads:
109. The incompatibility of membership in the United Nations with participation in the aggressive Atlantic bloc, and the creation by certain States, and primarily by the United States, of military bases in foreign territory;
110. The immediate cessation of military operations in Korea, the conclusion of a truce, the withdrawal of forces from the 38th parallel within a period of ten days, and the withdrawal of all foreign troops from Korea within a period of three months;
111. The convening of a world conference on the reduction of armaments and armed forces, the prohibition of atomic weapons, and the establishment of international control over the observance of that prohibition;
112. The conclusion of a peace pact between the five great Powers: the United States of America, the United Kingdom, France, China and the Soviet Union.
113. As a development of these proposals, which were made on 8 November the Soviet Union delegation deems it essential at the present time, for the reasons just stated, to make a number of additional proposals.
114. Firstly, we consider it essential that the General Assembly should adopt a resolution that: considering the use of atomic weapons, as weapons of aggression and of the mass destruction of people, to be at variance with the conscience and honour of peoples and incompatible with membership of the United Nations, it proclaims the unconditional prohibition of atomic weapons and the establishment of strict international control over the enforcement of this prohibition. We propose that the General Assembly should instruct the Atomic Energy and Conventional Armaments Commissions to prepare and submit to the Security Council, not later than 1 February 1952, for its consideration, a draft convention providing measures to ensure the implementation of the General Assembly decision on the prohibition of atomic weapons, the cessation of their production, the use of already manufactured atomic bombs exclusively for civilian purposes, and the establishment of strict international control over the observance of the above-mentioned convention.
115. Secondly, the General Assembly should recommend the permanent members of the Security Council, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, China and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, to reduce the armaments and armed forces in their possession at the time of the adoption of this recommendation by one-third during a period of one year from the date of its adoption. The Philippine representative has, of course, grossly distorted the facts by saying that all countries have reduced their armed forces with the exception of the Soviet Union. He has forgotten or has not read a number of official documents. I shall not deal with this aspect of the matter, as I am prepared to postpone detailed discussion of it until it is taken up in the First Committee; I shall merely say at this stage that we have demobilized thirty-three military age groups since the end of the war. It seems that Mr. Romulo is a general; he should know what thirty-three age groups means. If he does know and appreciate what they mean, he had no right to say what he did say from this rostrum. As I have already pointed out, however, he is an enthusiastic person and in his enthusiasm is often led to make statements which are contrary to the truth.
116. Thirdly, the General Assembly should recommend that forthwith and in any case not later than one month after the adoption by the General Assembly of the decisions on the prohibition of atomic weapons and the reduction by one-third of the armaments and armed forces of the five Powers, all States should submit complete official data on the situation of their armaments and armed forces, including data on atomic weapons and military bases in foreign territories. These data should relate to the situation obtaining at the time when the above-mentioned decisions are adopted by the General Assembly.
117. Lastly, we make the additional proposal that the General Assembly should recommend the establishment within the Security Council of an international control organ, the functions of which shall be to supervise the implementation of the decisions on the prohibition of atomic weapons and the reduction of armaments and armed forces, and to verify the data submitted by the States regarding the situation of their armaments and armed forces.
118. The significance of the foregoing proposals is obvious and requires no special clarification, I consider it necessary to dwell merely on our additional proposal for the one-third reduction by the permanent members of the Security Council of their armaments and armed forces, in connexion with the proposal we made on 8 November for the convening of a world conference on reduction of armaments and armed forces and the prohibition of atomic weapons. We consider it expedient and essential that the General Assembly should adopt in principle a recommendation concerning the reduction of armaments and the prohibition of atomic weapons, and that a world conference, with a wider membership, including all countries of the world, should consider specific questions arising out of these recommendations and affecting all the countries participating in the conference.
119. I would also recall that during the general debate a number of representatives, including Mr. Pearson, the head of the Canadian delegation, who of course is also at the same time chairman of the highest council of the aggressive Atlantic bloc, endeavoured to thwart our proposals for convening a world disarmament conference by asking: “Why wait until June? Is not the General Assembly itself a disarmament conference?”
120. These representatives will perhaps now be quite satisfied that we do not wish to postpone the reduction of armaments until the world conference which will have to draft practical measures but are proposing, as a supplement to our proposal for a world conference to consider the reduction of armaments, that a reduction by one-third of the armaments of the five Powers and the prohibition of atomic weapons should be discussed at the present session of the General Assembly.
121. We are profoundly convinced that if the proposals for the settlement of outstanding international questions, for an endeavour to put an end to the aggressive American war in Korea, for the reduction of armaments and the like are not mere words but really express the desire of the United. States, the United Kingdom and France, the three Powers which lead the Atlantic bloc and whose conduct determines the political climate in government circles in a number of other countries, then indeed the way will be opened for the General Assembly to adopt serious and responsible resolutions.
122. We are convinced, profoundly convinced, that the proposals of the Soviet Union make it possible for the General Assembly to proceed boldly and resolutely along this path.