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Schmidt, German Chancellor: The consultation in the NATO Council, if I may insert this here, has
been characterized for some time by our and our allies growing anxiety about certain shifts in the military
balance of power in Europe in favor of the Warsaw Pact. As long as we are not successful in guaranteeing
the necessary equilibrium through arms-control measures - if at all possible at a lower level than before -
the alliance must find recourse in military efforts in the conventional and also in the nuclear field to
guarantee its safety. Only in this manner can the governments of the member states of the alliance fulfill the
responsibility they have for protecting their people.
This judgment in no way frivolously overlooks the terror that every weapon which would be
necessary, which is available by political and military necessity, carries with it. We do this with the
purpose of hindering unfriendly developments which might lead to a situation in which these weapons for
mutual defense would actually have to be engaged.
For fifteen years it has been the general view of all members of the alliance that tactical. nuclear
weapons and their modernizing are a means which cannot be renounced in order to compensate for the
otherwise [greatly] superior military potential [opposed to us] of the Warsaw Pact. The discussions on the
so-called neutron bomb belong in this context.
The President of the U.S.A. on the 7th of April made known his decision  to postpone the production
of weapons with enhanced radiation . The final decision on the introduction of elements with enhanced
radiation into tactical nuclear weapons currently available in Europe should only cane later.
The decision of America, which must follow later, will be influenced by the restraint to be shown by
the Soviet Union in its conventional and nuclear weapons programs and peacetime troop deployment,
insofar as they concern the security of the U.S.A. and the security of western Europe,.
President Carter at the same time instructed the American Defense Secretary to proceed with
modernization of the Lance and of the 203-mm weapons system. Lance is a. relatively short-range rocket.
The 203-mm weapons system is an artillery cannon of the armed forces.
For some months the East has carried on a great public campaign against the production of the
neutron bomb and against its possible peacetime deployment in Europe. At the same time the Warsaw
Pact on its part has introduced new long-range nuclear weapons systems.
On the subject of the so-called ER weapons or neutron bombs, consultations have been going on
since autumn of last year, in the NATO Council but also bilaterally. In this from the beginning the
German government considered the relationship between the ER weapons and the balance of power,
which was imperiled in Europe by the increasing disparity in conventional weapons and in intermediate-
range nuclear weapons. Therefore the German government made the proposal at an early date of using
the option of neutron weapons as a political tool for arms limitation.
The pertinent elements of our position were and are:
First: In the time of Chancellor Adenauer the German government had already formally renounced
the use of atomic weapons. This we confirmed by our ratification of the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Participation in the decision of a nuclear-weaponed state on the production of nuclear weapons, for example
the neutron bomb, would be contrary to all previous practice of the Federal Republic, which is not a
nuclear-weaponed state. Therefore there had to be, and therefore any eventual decision to go into
production must remain a sovereign decision of the U.S.
Dr. Mertes (Gerolstein) (CDU/CSU): Formally, yes.
Schmidt: It was, after all, never otherwise. There are some persons I know who would like to have it
otherwise. I would not like to be one of them; I would also not like to give this impression to our western
friends and allies.
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- Applause by SPD and FDP -
Secondly: After a possible decision by the U.S.A. to go into production, the possibilities which
presented themselves to progress in the arms limitation negotiations, especially to the, extent of the actual
deployment of the neutron bomb, should be examined and such possibilities should then actually be used
in negotiation.
Thirdly: The German government in the consultations has declared its readiness to permit the storage [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]