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WH : 851 WHITE: 45 INCOMING TELEGRAM Department of State DTG 0117347 TELEGRAPH BRANCH M TOP SECRET SECUR TTV INFORMAT Action Control: 83 Rec'd: SS December 1, 1951 FROM: Rome 6:43 a.m. Info TO: Secretary of State DCR 423 NO: ACTEL 28, November 30, 10 p.m. FOR THE PRESIDENT FROM THE SECRETARY. Dear Mr. President: I am most grateful for your kind note of encouragement. It may be helpful to you to have some impressions from me at the end of the NATO meeting at Rome. The first is that the big problems remain unsolved and will need the most energetic work over the next 60 days, if we are to solve them. and In the international field we are experiencing what the pro- ARCHCORON duction people call slippages. Three months ago we hoped that the Ottawa meeting would start the wheels moving for decisions at this Rome meeting on a defense program geared to economic capacity and upon the integration of Germany, both into the Western community of free nations and into the West defensive organization. But as you know, it be - came clear before this meeting, that the complexity of the German problem and the current stage of Harriman's work in the temporary council committee meant that the Rome meeting would have to be a spur to get decisions by the end of January. Realization that the session could not reach important de - cisions affected the atmosphere in which the meeting was held. There was definite lessening of enthusiasm and interest. Another depressing factor was the knowledge that after Harriman's report, governments will have to decide definitely on the precise degree of military economic and financial effort to be made in the next years In Europe, this decision is hard because of low standards of living and, in many cases minute Parliamentary majorities. In France, the slender majority consists of a weak coalition of parties which do not see eye-to-eye on many key issues. The Communist parties remain strong in France and Italy and proclaim daily that the defense effort is leading to runaway inflation and economic chaos. In this situation, our goals for this meeting were: : 1. Convince the various nations to take the necessary steps to achieve REPRODUCTION OF THIS TOP SECRET SECURITY INFORMATION MESSAGE IS PROHIBITED