§ 2.43 p.m.
§ VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGHMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ [The Question was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government whether West German re-armament is only permitted within her obligations to N.A.T.O. and whether they agree or disagree with the suggestion which has been made in The Times newspaper that Western Germany is legally entitled to arrange to manufacture rockets and atomic warheads on non-German territory.]
§ THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE)My Lords, the answer to the first part of the question is "Yes". As for the second part of the Question, there is in fact no prohibition in the revised Brussels Treaty against the manufacture by Western Germany of atomic, biological and chemical weapons out- 491 side their own territory. It would, however, be entirely contrary to the spirit of the 1954 Brussels Treaty, and furthermore in direct contradiction to the statements repeatedly made by the Federal German Government. Her Majesty's Government have no reason to believe that the Federal German Government does not intend loyally to abide by the spirit and obligations which it has accepted through membership of N.A.T.O. and W.E.U.
§ VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGHMy Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Marquess for the Answer he has given, and I am glad to hear from him the view of the Government as to the spirit in which these matters should be conducted. But does he not agree that the latest statement from Dr. Adenauer is sufficient to give rise to still further anxiety in this country as to how these matters are going to be treated by Germany? In the light of the published report in the Sunday newspaper, that they are actually ordering tens of millions of pounds' worth of atomic missiles in the United States of America, I should be glad to know whether all this has been carried out within the spirit to which the noble Marquess referred. There is nothing in the statement of the German Government so far which gives us any ground for increased confidence in their co-operation.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I think we must all agree that these are matters that must be decided in N.A.T.O.; and indeed they will be.
§ LORD HENDERSONMy Lords, may I ask the noble Marquess, who says that there is no prohibition on Western Germany's producing atomic, chemical and biological weapons outside their own territory, whether it is not a fact that the effect of the Paris Agreements was to substitute for occupation freedom for Germany within N.A.T.O.; that the Agreement restored to Federal Germany the full authority of a sovereign State over its internal and external affairs, and that as part of that arrangement the German Chancellor reaffirmed an undertaking or declaration which he had made in London on October 3, 1954, resigning the right to make atomic, biological and chemical weapons? Am I to understand 492 that if a nation voluntarily resigns its sovereign right in respect of an important matter affecting its own internal territory—which is the only place where its sovereign rights operate—it can at the same time reserve to itself the right to do that very thing in somebody else's territory? That seems to me to be a most important point.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I would not disagree with the noble Lord that this is important, but it is purely hypothetical. I think perhaps it might be helpful if I just go over two or three points arising from The Times article to which the noble Viscount the Leader of the Opposition referred. First (I think your Lordships all know this), the whole build-up of the German defence effort is supervised by the North Atlantic Council. All forces of N.A.T.O. countries on the Continent of Europe, with very minor exceptions, notably national defence and police forces, are under the control of the Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, and every year N.A.T.O. conducts a review of the size and the scope of national defence efforts in which each member has to declare its allocation and deployment of national forces for defence. The revised Brussels Treaty lays down the level of the forces of each member of W.E.U. and this can be increased only in accordance with N.A.T.O. requirements and with the unanimous consent of all the members of W.E.U. The Treaty also requires the armaments of member countries to be in accordance with—I think this is important—the needs of their forces. Even supposing, in the hypothetical case, that the West Germans were to manufacture, or were to have manufactured, any weapons outside German territory, such weapons could not be used without N.A.T.O. consent.
§ LORD BOOTHBYMy Lords, may I ask the noble Marquess one question which is not at all hypothetical—namely, can he give the House any information as to what precisely the Germans have been up to in Spain, and whether prior approval of N.A.T.O. for whatever they have done—it may be they have done nothing—was obtained?
LORD REAMy Lords, if the noble Marquess would not mind my asking a supplementary question, may I ask whether Her Majesty's Government could 493 give any result of any investigations they may have made into the possible connection between the German-Spanish conversations and evidence of some resurgence of Nazi mentality in Western Germany?
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, in reply to the noble Lord, Lord Boothby, it is not possible to give any exact information as to what has been happening. As I told your Lordships on Thursday, no specific proposals have been made, so that there is no specific matter which we can discuss. All we know is that there have been conversations, and that is really as far as our information goes. I believe that answers the noble Lord's question. I am afraid the question of the noble Lord, Lord Rea, is rather wide-reaching and far away from the original Question.
§ LORD HENDERSONMy Lords, if I may press the noble Marquess, may I say that we are aware of the facts which the noble Marquess gave in his reply to me, but, with all respect, they do not answer the point I have raised. My noble Leader put the point very clearly: do Her Majesty's Government agree with the statement by The Times? I gather from the answer of the noble Marquess that Her Majesty's Government do agree with The Times. Now that is the very point I am taking up. I am asking the noble Marquess whether, if a Government voluntarily surrenders or limits its sovereign right—in this case in respect of producing atomic and other weapons on its own territory—that does not also include the surrender of the right to make the same things on somebody else's territory. I feel that we are entitled to just as clear an answer on that point as we had on the other.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I can assure your Lordships that I was not seeking to be evasive. I thought I had made clear that there is, in fact. no prohibition in the revised Brussels Treaty against the manufacture by West Germany of atomic, biological or chemical weapons outside her territory. I particularly wished to answer this question as directly as I could. However, I qualified it by saying that it goes completely against the whole spirit of the thing, and we have no reason to sup- 494 pose, after we have heard these repeated statements from the German Federal Government, that our Ally is doing anything sinister or underhand or not correct. I feel that it is not wise to jump to conclusions at once that something strange, sinister and underhand is being done.
§ LORD HENDERSONMy Lords, I have been very careful in all the questions I have put to-day and those I put last week not to involve the Federal German Government at all. My question and that of my noble Leader was based on the statement in The Times and I want to say quite frankly that it is the first time in all these years that I have heard anybody put forward the right of Germany to make atomic weapons outside her own territory. What we are trying to find out is whether the view expressed by The Times is accepted by Her Majestys' Government. We are not involving the Federal German Government. So far as I know, they have never asked for, or claimed, the right to do this; and I am making no charges against the Federal German Government. But if the noble Marquess is right, Her Majesty's Government agree with the statement in The Times that Federal Germany has this right. May I ask whether, when these Conventions were negotiated and this precise term was discussed—"within German territory", which is no accidental phrase—any reservation was made by the Germans that it applied to their rights within Germany and not to their rights without Germany?
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I will tell your Lordships at once that I do not know the answer to that question, but I thought I had made it perfectly clear, and I repeat it for a third time, that there is no specific prohibition contained within the terms of the Brussels Treaty. As to the last point raised by the noble Lord, I do not know the answer. I will certainly make it my business to find out.
VISCOUNT ELIBANKMy Lords, may I ask the noble Marquess whether he is aware that the anxiety expressed by the noble Viscount the Leader of the Opposition is enhanced by the fact that Herr Krupp, who broke his word of honour—if he ever had any—never again to engage in the manufacture of industrial steel and iron, signed a contract on 495 February 3 last with a firm in Bilbao to erect a modern, up-to-date German steel plant with a capacity of 400,000 tons a year? And has the noble Marquess yet any information on a Question I put down the other day, namely, is there any information to show that Herr Krupp was a party to the approaches on the part of Herr Strauss, the German Defence Minister, for military bases in Spain?
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, with regard to the last point I have no further information on that subject. I know it has been alleged that there was to be a factory at Bilbao manufacturing German missiles. As I believe your Lordships are well aware, this has been categorically denied both by the Government of the German Federal Republic and by the Spanish Government.
§ LORD HENDERSONMy Lords, may I put a supplementary question? I agree that there is no specific prohibition in the documents, apart from manufacture "on German territory", but would he be good enough to inquire whether, when this 1954 Agreement was made, any reservation was made by Federal Germany that they would still have the right to make these weapons on somebody else's territory, or whether, when a Government resign their sovereign rights in respect of a particular matter within their own territory that Government automatically still have the right to do the same thing in somebody else's territory.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I will certainly try to help the noble Lord over this point, but, as I said earlier, even supposing the hypothetical case that such weapons were made, the German Federal Government would not be able to use them.
§ LORD HENDERSONMy Lords, with all respect, that is not the point.
§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNEMy Lords, I appreciate that it is not the point, but it is also a fact.
§ VISCOUNT ALEXANDER OF HILLSBOROUGHMy Lords, I feel we are all very thankful that the House has been patient during Question Time, but this is a very important matter. I do 496 not wish to pursue it at this moment but I would ask Her Majesty's Government to submit to Parliament a White Paper covering the whole of the matters which have been raised, giving the history of the documents and stating where they have been, by action, departed from "in spirit"—which are the words used by Her Majesty's Government—and what is proposed to be done, in order that the matter can be properly debated in Parliament.