So you explained this problem of the growing risk.. .

Yes, in the, in the mid-'50's, I was concerned about the improvements of the, uh, first, uh, ballistic missiles. Uh... in the '50's, mid-'50's, uh, they could, uh, not reach America. But, uh, it was obvious that, uh, in a certain delay of, certain... many years, uh, these weapons would hit American soil. And then American strategy would change. And, uh, to explain my concern, I prepare a chart... which I showed to my boss, to General Norstad. Uh... this, uh, is a presentation of the chart. And my idea was to explain to him that the Amer-, American risk was increasing with time. With the advent of new weapons, such, mainly, as long-range ballistic missiles, in the period which, at that time, I thought it was '65. We were in the -- '56. We had nine years to take... into account the consequence of the improvements. And, uh, my point was that as soon as America would be on the frontline as we were already, they would change their strategy. Then, my country, and possibly other countries of Europe, had to find a substitute for a North American commitment The defense of Europe was, uh, nonconditional before, and they may be con-, conditional later.

What you mean by that is --

... the fact that, uh, the American were fully committed, before '60.

To using their strategic nuclear --

To, to use atomic weapons to protect Europe.

Could you just say that again for us?

Before 1960, when the American were out of reach, of reach, we had no doubt in our minds that they would use atomic weapons from the onset of any serious attack against any country of Europe, because they were out of reach themselves. The risks were, risks were small, after all. But, it was easy to foresee that ten years later, the situation would change and that America being the first lines, in the same position vis-a-vis the enemy than Europe, they would, uh, change their strategy, and try to reduce the atomic commitments. Hence, we had to find a substitute, and, uh, General Norstad agrees. He said, uh, to me that, uh, that was probably what was going to take place, and he said you should inform your government. This is why I, uh, ask the permission to take some charts from the safe home into the English one, and to go with such a chart and some others, to see my prime minister. It was a Socialist prime minister, Mr. Guy Mollet. I saw him between, uh, 11:00 in the night to 3:00 in the morning, and we had a lonq talk, during which I explained the changement of strategy which was likely to take place, and, uh, he said to me, he began... begin, the beginning was, he said to me the following, uh, sentence, which was very amusing: he said, "My last political campaign was on three topics: one, uh, the peace in Algeria; two, the reduction of taxes; and three, disarmament. I am making war in Algeria. To wage war in Algeria I have to increase the taxes, and you want that I give atomic weapons to the French armament -- uh, the atomic weapons, the French weapons. And, uh, forget... my plea for disarmament." I said, uh, "Mr. President, you have fooled the French... on two points. The third one seems to be much more important." And then he said to me, uh, "Yes. It's not you.... uh, which is going to face the electors.", Well, I said, "Mr. President, uh, I have not, I am a military man, but, uh, according to what you just said to me, I think that your political career is finished. Why not to do something very important for the future?" And he said to me, "You are right. We shall ring the Minister of Defense, Mr. Bourgès-Maunoury, and we are going to see him at once, to talk to him about your findings at SHAPE." Which I did. And in July, uh, '56, a council of defense took place, in which there, during three or four hours, I have the possibility to explain... with 20 or 40 charts, uh, all the new concepts which were studied at SHAPE. And the decision to announce to the public... that the French would develop their own atomic weapons was taken, and announced that very month of July. I must say that the... what took place in Egypt, over the canal, was a great help. Hence, uh, in December, '56 --

Perhaps you could tell us why.

Well, for the first time, uh, the American, uh--

Let's start again....

Yes. Uh, you see that in, uh, 19, uh, July '56, uh, the nation, uh... Suez Canal was nationalized. An operation was organized --

we can assume that we know that -- I"m interested in the reaction of the French.

And, uh, during that expedition... we had a sort of, uh, common action between the Americans and the Soviets to prevent us to carry on our attack. And that had a very profound, very deep impact on the French mentality. For the first time, a crack in the alliance was visible, and, uh, we had also the feeling that the Soviets, helping the Egyptians, were turning NATO by the [thoughts]. And, uh, during the, uh, budgetary debates, in December, '56, the whole Assembly, excluding the communists, uh, were in favor of French having atomic weapons. Including the socialists. That was a great help for the future. And this is why, in March '57, the decision was taken to build a factory to separate isotopes of uranium, and to have enriched uranium to prepare a thermonuclear weapons. In '57.

So you think the French felt very let down by the Americans, they felt bitter.

The French were very bitter to see, very furious to see that the, uh, American, uh, naval forces tried to, uh... interrupt, uh, our action from Cyprus to, uh, to, to coastline of Egypt. And, uh, if you add to that the [bullying] statements, telling us what would be your reaction if I was bombing London and Paris as you are bombing Suez or Port Said, we had the feeling that the two big nations, uh, were, had found a common aim against us.

Now, you also talked to GeneRal de Gaulle about these ideas of yours. Could you tell us briefly about that meeting?

A few, a few days later, General Norstad told me that, uh, I mean, three days later my, uh, interview, uh, my, uh, meeting with the prime minister, General Norstad told me that I should see General de Gaulle. I said, "General de Gaulle, uh, is not in power; I am not a politician, but I think he would never, uh, return to the, to power -- uh, General de Gaulle is a man of tanks, and probably, uh, not ready to... accept such a strategy which is changing everything, so I may waste my time." And Norstad said, "No, you are completely wrong; I read the translation of his book; uh, General de Gaulle is a great strategist, and you have to tell him what we are doing." So, I said, "Sir, alright; may I take from the safe home some charts?" He said so; I had, I got an MP to protect... this, uh, charts, and I went to see General de Gaulle to the Hotel [LaPerousse], where every Wednesday evening he was receiving some friends. Uh, my appointment was at half-past nine, and I stayed with him until, uh, two or three 0' clock in the morning. Uh, showing... to him some 40 charts, and, uh, explaining the work we are doing at SHAPE by preparing a completely new strategy. And I was very surprised that, uh, after a few, uh, uh ... probably two hours of speech, General de Gaulle began to talk, finally to talk.... in a loud voice, thinking, uh, loudly, I would say; and he was, uh understanding everything which was explained to him, and not only that, but he was using the same slang, the same language as, language that we were using... within our, uh, group of colonels, because when you have to prepare a new strategy, very revolutionary, you always, uh, invent new words. And General DeGaulle, uh, was very impressing, because he was using the same type of vo-, vocabulary. For instance, he said to me that, uh, it is not necessary to have the same number of weapons than the other side; what is mandatory is to be capable to, uh... to "arrachet," he said -

Tear off.

-- To "tear off" one arm. Uh, and we said, uh, that it was sufficient to cut one hand. Similar. Then, uh... after two o'clock in the morning, uh, he said to me that it was late and I should take some rest. And as we are both alone -- the MP was downstairs -- uh, he took to me, uh, he.... he brought the charts, which were very heavy, uh, probably, uh, uh, 40 pounds, to the lift with me. Happily he was told to lower my arms, so he opened the door of the lift -- it was a, an old lift -- and put my charts in, and he said to me, "Uh, look, uh, Gallois, you should take some rest now; uh, in the future, I shall take care of your career." So I went back home, uh, I said to my wife that I had just left Louis the 14th, and that I was written on his list.

So you had some admiration for him after that.

I always had a lot of admiration for him, because I was in England during the duration, in the war, already I was in the Royal Air Force, but, uh, General de Gaulle was, uh, in a way my boss; and, uh, uh, I always had a great admiration for what he read, uh, what he wrote; I had all his books, and, uh...

Perhaps I could ask you this: do you think there would have been an atomic nuclear force without de Gaulle, and would it have been the same?

Yes, but a very different one... We may have had, without General DeGaulle, a very different, uh, atomic force. Because when I talked to Mr. Guy Mollet, the idea of the, uh, socialist prime minister, was to develop an atomic weapon in France, and to give, uh, such an atomic force to the pool of European nations. To, uh, increase the strengths of the European defense. Not at all on a national basis. General de Gaulle transformed it into the weapon of a nation, French nation, having in mind that, uh, these weapons of, uh, the effects of these weapons are so terrible, that you cannot share their use, and that only a nation may decide to use them, to use them, should this nation be in a very great danger. And... General DeGaulle and I support the idea; I think that, thought that atomic weapons could not be the weapons of a military alliance. But, just the weapon of a nation in a... desesparate (sic) situation. Using such a weapon as a last spasm; accepting to die standing instead of, instead of dying laying. It was really a lastresort weapon, and... you cannot, you cannot share such a weapon with another state.

Now, that may be true of the strategic weapons, but of course at SHAPE there had been for some years a philosophy that looked on much smaller nuclear weapons as weapons like any other, for fighting wars.

The strategic weapons which we had in mind to develop in France, uh, were accompanied... I would say, I would say, uh, by, uh, a large number of so-called tactical weapons: shorter range, and sometimes, uh... smaller yield. These weapons were deployed by the Americans in Europe in great numbers, reaching, I think, the figure of 7,000. They were exceeding by far any military need, naturally. But I think that this deployment was to deter the Soviets from any military action, and also to discourage the Soviets by imitating the Americans. Such a last idea was, uh... hung. Because now --

I just want to ask you a question about that. Did not the people who were planning the deployment of these large numbers of weapons worry that the Soviet Union would have to simply imitate them and would catch up and deploy the same numbers?

In the... end of the '60, in the end of the '50's, beginning of '60's, when these weapons were deployed... several ideas were, uh, in the mind of the responsible people. First, uh, it was... one way to reduce the strategic commitments of the Americans, and to replace it by a, an atomic force, used locally, without, uh, figuring an, an atomic exchange from Russia to America and America to Russia. Two, the idea was to, uh, give a re-, an insurance to the Allies, to the Allies, uh, because, uh, some were anxious about the consequences of the new strategy of flexible response. Delaying the moment where atomic weapons will be used, and three, the third idea was to discourage the Soviets, to imitate, uh, what the American might is capable to do, in the field of armament. We thought at that time that the ... economy of the Soviets was in such a situation that they could not afford to deploy as many weapons. And there is another idea which is also hung; it is that... reasoning by analogy with the past, we thought that the nation or the coalition having more weapons than the other one is by nature, uh, victorious. That was the sort of, uh, permanent souvenir of the last wars, where numbers were decisive sometimes. For all these reasons, we... uh, de-, uh, deploy some 7,000, uh, uh, relatively low-yield and short-range atomic weapons, which are now withdrawn because, uh, obviously, uh, they exceed by far, uh, the targets which, uh, we, which would be destroyed in Western Europe or in Eastern Europe.