Cabinet Meeting Minutes

NATIONAL ARCHIVES AND RECORDS SERVICE CABINET MEETING, DECEMBER , 1951 Last Meeting of Year All members present (1st time in months) Photo was taken of Cabinet COL HOY Briefed Cabinet on Korea. VICE PRES Described his recent visit to Japan and Korea. Had Thanksgiving dinner with members of Air Forces in Korea. Visited hospitals in Korea, Tokyo and Honolulu. Found morale and spirit of troops at the highest. Mutual respect of men and officers is remarkable. Japanese indicate real appreciation of treatment they have received from U. S. since the war. ACHESON Trip of V. P. was great success fine reaction in countries visited. In Europe in recent weeks held meetings of U. N. NATO and other organi- zations. President's proposal for reduction in armaments had good effect in Europe. Both Western Europe and Soviet satellites are fearful of aggression by either side. Vishinsky laughed at proposals for peace - however this was a great blunder on part of Vishinsky as reaction in Europe to proposal was serious and considerate. Eisenhower and McNarney have done a prodigious job on NATO program under most trying circumstances. Meeting with Adenauer resulted in a guarantee to Germans that an attack on Germany will be considered as an attack on us. Difficulty is our in- ability to negotiate treaty with Germany as the country is now divided and is not sovereign. Germany is faced with problem with British and French who say they can't afford to pay one cent for support of troops in Germany. German expenditure for this purpose is 1/2 of all the money she can raise for defense purposes. Financial and supply problems for a united Western Europe are the serious bottlenecks in getting this NATO program underway. Unless we in the U. S. can get together to make sure what we have done SO far in Europe is not allowed to disintegrate in the next 60 to 90 days - we must bolster our European allies or we are sunk. This far transcends even the importance of the Far East.