Beyond Skybolt

The sessions began in a dismal political climate. At issue between President Kennedy and Prime Minister Harold Macmillan. meeting in Nassau last week, were questions that went to the nature not only of Anglo-American amity but also of the entire Western alliance. But as the talks broke up at week's end, the sun was peeking through the clouds.

In specific dispute between Kennedy and Macmillan was the all-but-final U.S. decision to scrap the Skybolt missile project (TIME, Dec. 21). The U.S. had promised to supply Britain with at least 100 Skybolts, and the British, with no long-range missile capability of their own, had built many of their defense plans around the bomber-launched weapon.

Even before the U.S. decision hit them, the British were feeling fretful. The U.S. had taken action in the recent Cuba crisis without even going through the motions of consulting Macmillan in advance; this brought home to Britons the painful fact that the U.S. no longer treats Britain in keeping with that "special relationship" brought to such heights by Winston Churchill. The sparks of anger over Skybolt therefore fell upon tinder of shredded pride and splintered pretensions. In the House of Commons, a Tory member thundered that "the British people are tired of being pushed around." U.S.-British relations, rumbled the Paris financial daily, Information, "are today in a state of complete crisis." Cried the Daily Herald, summing up U.S. treatment of Britain: "Suez to Skybolt, it has been a pretty rotten road."

Foredoomed Hope. For Macmillan, already beset by grave political and economic difficulties at home (see THE WORLD), the Sky-bolt decision threatened disaster. He had built his foreign policy around the idea that his nation's "special relationship" with the U.S. gave Britain influence in world affairs out of all proportion to its military and economic power. Before boarding a plane for the Bahamas, Macmillan managed a jaunty smile and cheerful words. "I have no doubt," he said, "that we shall find our way through our difficulties in the spirit of agreement we have always had with the American people." But in the background was a grim awareness that his political survival might depend on bringing some sort of trophy back from Nassau.

Macmillan got to Nassau first, was waiting at the airport to greet Kennedy when the President arrived. During the airport ceremonies, the Nassau police band struck up an old English song. Early One Morning, the words of which run:

Oh, don't deceive me, Oh, never leave me, How could you use A poor maiden so?

If Macmillan cherished any idea that Kennedy would relent on Skybolt. that hope was foredoomed. Kennedy had been convinced by U.S. Defense Secretary Robert McNamara that Skybolt was not worth the money or effort. The U.S. team at Nassau therefore tried to downplay Skybolt's significance to the conference.

The talks, said U.S. spokesmen, would cover a wide range of topics--NATO, the Common Market, Russia, the Chinese invasion of India, and especially the Congo. This ploy grated on the British. Cried an indignant British newsman: "They couldn't care less about Skybolt! All they want to talk about is the Congo!" But what they did, in fact, was talk about Skybolt.

Harsh Fact. Throughout the sessions, both sides maintained almost leakproof security, issuing only a few brief, bland announcements. Relying upon imagination, British correspondents kept reporting that behind the closed doors Macmillan was adamantly insisting that the U.S. carry on with Skybolt. But it gradually became clear that it was Kennedy who was being adamant. After many hours of discussion, Macmillan and Defense Minister Peter Thorneycroft came to accept the alternative that Kennedy offered: instead of Skybolt, the J.S. would supply Britain with Polaris, a seasoned, already operational missile with a range--1.800 miles--nearly twice what had been planned for Skybolt.

That agreement gave Macmillan his needed trophy to take back home, but it will not really provide Britain with the independent nuclear deterrent that Skybolt was supposed to have provided. Polaris is designed to be fired from submarines; Britain does not have, and will not have for years to come, any submarines capable of firing the missile, and cannot afford to build very many of them.

The harsh fact of the matter is that Britain cannot really afford any kind of independent long-range missile force, whether launched from sea, land or sky--and neither can any other single nation in Western Europe. The U.S.'s long-range hope and goal is a united Western Europe that is big enough and rich enough to be a third superpower.

Shield & Sword. The Kennedy-Macmillan agreement fitted into that grand design. Eventually, the understanding ran, Britain's Polaris forces will be incorporated into a supranational NATO nuclear force. The U.S., said the final communique, would provide "at least equal'' Polaris missiles and submarines "for inclusion in a NATO multilateral nuclear force." Also, both countries committed themselves to assign to NATO "some part of the forces already in existence," including British bombers and U.S. tactical nuclear weapons. U.S. offi cials announced that President Kennedy had offered France's President Charles de Gaulle Polaris missiles on the same terms that Macmillan agreed to -- the missiles and submarines would eventually come under NATO control.

In Plain Terms. "The President and the Prime Minister," said the communi que, "agreed that in addition to having a nuclear shield it is important to have a non-nuclear sword. For this purpose they agreed on the importance of increasing the effectiveness of their conventional forces on a worldwide basis." This pro vision was in keeping with a basic strategic goal of the Kennedy Administration.

The U.S. wants the nations of Western Europe to abandon the idea of independent national nuclear forces, and instead build up conventional military forces to balance Russia's armies. National nuclear forces, the U.S. argues, will at best be too small to add any meaningful increment of deterrence to the U.S.'s massive nuclear power, will only increase the like lihood of nuclear war.

In the current issue of Foreign Affairs, Dean Acheson. Secretary of State under Harry Truman and now a foreign-policy adviser to the New Frontier, argues that, in concert, the nations of Western Europe could defend themselves by conventional weapons alone against a non-nuclear Russian attack, and that a nuclear buildup in Europe constitutes "a tragic misuse of resources."

In a TV interview summing up the first two years of his Administration. President Kennedy early last week stated the case in plain terms: "We don't want six or seven nuclear powers in Europe diverting their funds to nuclear power when the U.S. has got this tremendous arsenal." And the President bluntly voiced his growing impatience with British and European bellyaching about U.S. contributions to the common defense. "We are doing our part." he said. "We have our troops in Western Europe, we have six divisions, which is about a fourth of all the divisions on the Western front. They are the best equipped. They can fight tomorrow, which is not true of most of the other units . . . So the United States is more than doing its part. We hope Western Europe will make a greater effort on its own, both in developing conventional forces and in assistance to the underdeveloped world." That seemed little enough to ask.

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