§ Q3. Mr. Eldon Griffithsasked the Prime Minister if he will convene a meeting of Heads of Government of the Western European Union to consider new initiatives for nuclear sharing among European members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.
§ Q14. Mr. Raphael Tuckasked the Prime Minister whether it is his policy that Great Britain should share any nuclear secrets with France.
§ The Prime MinisterThe Government's policy has always been that the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation is the most suitable forum for co-operation on nuclear defence policy. The Nuclear Planning Group and the wider Nuclear Defence Affairs Committee were specifically established for this purpose and there have been regular meetings of these bodies.
§ Mr. GriffithsSince the Foreign Secretary has only just accepted in Brussels the need for a political and technological identity of purpose between Britain and the European community, does it not follow that sooner or later, short of general disarmament, there must be a European deterrent? Therefore, would it not be wise to start exploring with the French those areas where we could collaborate on nuclear questions for our mutual financial advantage?
§ The Prime MinisterI thought that the right hon. Member for Kinross and West Perthshire (Sir Alec Douglas-Home) issued one or two wise words on this subject, if he was correctly reported, today, as I am sure he was. That is a different issue from a European deterrent. Of course, we are prepared and always have been, to discuss at any time with the French Government mutual questions of interest in the field of nuclear weapons, including, for example, the desirability of their observing the test ban agreement and signing the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
This is very different from a nuclear deterrent, which the hon. Gentleman is suggesting, and which raises the gravest dangers about a German finger on the trigger, and which would, as I understand it, involve a total derogation from at:. Non-Proliferation Treaty, except in some 879 future situation where there is only one country, one Government and one Defence Ministry in Europe.
§ Mr. Raphael TuckDoes my right hon. Friend agree that in view of our atomic agreement with the United States we could not share any nuclear secrets with a European Power without obtaining leave from the United States Government, and that the United States Government could not give us leave without infringing their MacMahon Act?
§ The Prime MinisterThe position of the United States and successive agreements by successive Governments with the United States here are well understood. I believe that there is a great capacity—and I have urged this on the late President of France—for Anglo-French cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. I would be extremely careful about anything in the weapons sense, in a bilateral sense or in any sense outside N.A.T.O., where up till now the French have not been very much involved in nuclear planning matters. This is the right centre for doing this.
§ Mr. RipponWill the Prime Minister confirm the view that the Secretary of State for Defence expressed first in Munich earlier this year that there must be a distinct European defence capability within N.A.T.O., and does he agree that that must involve some degree of nuclear sharing based on Anglo-French co-operation?
§ The Prime MinisterI confirm what my right hon. Friend said in Munich. He has gone a long way to making his words a reality by setting up arrangements for much closer co-operation on defence matters between European countries, but within N.A.T.O., and within the overall control of N.A.T.O. I do not believe that the conclusion which the right hon. and learned Gentleman draws from this is right. I do not believe that this means a European nuclear deterrent, which would be divisive of N.A.T.O., involve separatist tendencies in N.A.T.O., and involve, except in the circumstances which I mentioned to the hon. Gentleman, a breach of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, which this country has ratified.
§ Mr. John MendelsonAs the Conservative spokesman on defence and the 880 Leader of the Opposition on occasion have supported proposals in the recent past which would lead to our agreeing to a separate nuclear command within the European Economic Community, as a price of Britain's entry into that community, and as these ideas are put forward by Herr Strauss and other people in leading political positions in Germany, would my right hon. Friend reaffirm the Government's policy that they regard this as very dangerous, and that they would not trade such an offer against Britain's entry into the Common Market?
§ The Prime MinisterI have stated the Government's position many times and have repeated it again today. I do not think that it is necessary to add to what I have said.
§ Mr. HeathCould the Prime Minister explain how it is that one can have a nuclear planning group in N.A.T.O. of which the Germans are members and there is no danger, with which I agree, but that if one has a nuclear planning group of European Powers of which the Germans are members there is talk of the Germans having a finger on the trigger?
§ The Prime MinisterI referred to the German finger on the trigger in reference to a phrase used by the hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds (Mr. Eldon Griffiths) about a European deterrent. A European deterrent means control over that deterrent. A nuclear planning group for consultation, of which the Germans are members, is a valuable development within N.A.T.O. The right hon. Gentleman will be as pleased as the rest of us when the French agree to co-operate wholeheartedly in that. It is a very different thing to have a consultative group in N.A.T.O., N.A.T.O. being the overriding authority, on the one hand, as compared with a European community deterrent in which European nations decide when the deterrent is to be used.
§ Mr. HeathIn that case, if there was a Franco-British deterrent within the nuclear planning group within N.A.T.O. there could be no objection?
§ The Prime MinisterThe right hon. Gentleman has on a number of occasions, both in this country and abroad, proposed a Franco-British deterrent. So far as that is concerned, there would be no derogation from the authority of N.A.T.O., 881 because it would be two existing nuclear Powers combining. There may be many arguments against that, and in my view this is a matter on which we are certainly not prepared to propose anything to the French Government. That is a very different thing, as his own arguments suggest, from a European deterrent with other people deciding who pulls the trigger.