May 28, 1976
Note re: German-Iranian Nuclear Agreement; Meeting with State Secretary Haunschild on 28 May 1976
This document was made possible with support from Carnegie Corporation of New York (CCNY)
[Federal Ministry for Research and Technology]
III B 5 966805/5
Bonn, 29 May 1976
N o t e:
RE: German-Iranian Nuclear Agreement
here: Meeting with State Secretary Haunschild[1] on 28 May 1976
Participants: see Appendix[2]
The following needs to be noted pertaining to the meeting:
1. Removal of the Fuel Cycle from the Agreement
a) State Secretary Haunschild advocated strongly against the U.S. demand to remove the fuel cycle from the agreement. Reasons:
- U.S. proposal from 23rd/24th May 1976 is coming too late (negotiations with Iran since 1974, [most recent] consultation with United States still in April 1976)
- Reference to the positive statement by the Federal Chancellor [Helmut Schmidt] towards the Shah in December 1975
- Risking of KWU [German Kraftwerk Union][3] contracts (volumes of 7.9 billion German Marks, of which already 1 billion used up for construction). Iran is “fiercely determined” not to extend the letter of intent beyond 30 June 1976. Linkage between signing of contracts with the agreement over the Nuclear Agreement.
- U.S. request for export moratorium regarding sensitive facilities would create for the receiving side an unbearable situation especially with regard to reprocessing facilities, since this way they would have to resolve their waste disposal problems. In fact, a moratorium would result in the export countries having to take over the reprocessing themselves. Since such would ultimately only be possible for the United States without any maximum difficulties, the United States would gain a competitive advantage that cannot be accepted. De facto this would turn the United States into the monopolist of the world nuclear market.
State Secretary Hermes[4] stated in contrast that he had warned from the beginning about an “easy path to Tehran”. Because of Iran, one can risk at best a “medium conflict” with the United States. Kissinger[5], however, has hinted at serious problems for us if we do not accept the U.S. proposal. Recently the U.S. position regarding the non-proliferation issue has undergone a fundamental change. The United States are ever more viewing the peaceful use of nuclear energy as well as an inherent danger for world peace. With a moratorium for sensitive facilities, they are hoping at least for some mitigating effect here.
Since, according to Kissinger, Giscard[6] is in principle positively inclined towards a moratorium, a German isolation must be feared - other than in the case of our Brazil Agreement.
Mr. Braubach referred to the overall economic consequences, which could come with a global limitation of the peaceful use of nuclear energy, as well as to the potential consequences for the Federal Republic itself, especially in terms of energy policy.
As a result, the following compromise was agreed upon:
Cooperation with regard to the fuel cycle will remain part of the [German-Iranian] Agreement. However, it should be attempted to add to the planned exchange of letters with Iran a provision that we are not delivering within a certain period any sensitive facilities. Since not before the end of several years, Iran will actually have an economic or practical need for a preprocessing facility, such a solution would take into account both the interests of Iran and the U.S. concerns (de facto accepting a temporally limited moratorium).
b) No complete agreement was reached on the question how we should behave at the conference of nuclear export countries on the 3rd and 4th of June 1976 in London. State Secretary Haunschild recommended strongly to agree at best to a short-term moratorium and have it not affecting our Iran Agreement any more. State Secretary Hermes considered especially the latter as not implementable vis-a-vis the Americans.
2. Reprocessing outside of Iran
State Secretary Haunschild answered positively to the decisive question whether we should adopt an option, according to which we could potentially take over the tasks assigned to a third country in lieu of the latter - in case fuel rods used in Iran that we had exported before would be brought to a third country for reprocessing. He did not see a special problem for us here, as the occurrence of such a theoretical case can be almost completely excluded. Actually, only a few countries would be candidates for such a reprocessing and all of them would be acceptable from our side (especially the United States, France, England; with regard to the CoCom[7] countries there already has a been a German right to veto envisaged).
State Secretary Hartkopf[8] is considering our own [nuclear waste] disposal plans as getting in jeopardy if such an option - and even so its chance to materialize would be highly unlikely - would become publicly known, what by the way would be certain (resistance of the population). If there is no indication towards safe [nuclear] waste disposal in our country until about spring 1977, the Federal Ministry of the Interior is determined to suspend the use of our nuclear power plants by then already.
Mr. Braubach emphasized that with this option our own nuclear plans must not be jeopardized. On the other hand, our domestic policy situation should be viewed rationally and not become over-dramatized.
Following the request of the Federal Ministry of the Interior, one agreed to the following raw phrasing:
“Iran will not export against the will of the German side, if the latter verifies to Iran an opportunity for reprocessing in third countries”.
This phrase does not mention a reprocessing option in Germany. It remains to be figured out how the United States will react to this. Basically the ball (the reprocessing) is kicked in their field.
3. Object Security (physical protection)
According to State Secretary Haunschild, the German demand to reach an agreement with Iran about security standards is met with Iranian resistance, because Iran is seeing the danger to be forced to maintain different standards by different export countries.
There was agreement to accommodate this understandable request by using the recommendations of the IAEA[9] in their respective details as a foundation. This solution would be also of advantage as Iran is rejecting the object security standards of the nuclear export countries (London) for reasons of principle.
4. Further Process
a) At the sidelines of the June conference in London it should be attempted to gauge the U.S. reaction to our concepts - without handing over any paper documentation.
b) Following up, a meeting of the Ministers concerned (Research and Technology, Foreign Affairs, Interior, Economic Affairs) with the Federal Chancellor as soon as possible.
c) After that a new round of negotiations with Iran as well as
d) Final involvement of the [Federal] Cabinet [of Ministers], if at all possible before 30 June 1976.
[Signed Gutermuth]
Dr. Gutermuth
[1] Hans-Hilger Haunschild (1928-2012), State Secretary in the Federal Ministry for Research and Technology from 1972 to 1987.
[2] Not part of the document. From German Federal Ministries (Research and Technology, Foreign Affairs, Economic Affairs, Interior).
[3] Subsidiary of Siemens and AEG Corporations for nuclear power plant construction.
[4] Peter Hermes (1922-2015), State Secretary in the Federal Foreign Office between 1975 and 1979.
[5] Henry Kissinger (born 1923). U.S. Secretary of State 1973-1976.
[6] Valery Giscard d’Estaing (1926-2020), President of France from 1974 to 1981.
[7] Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls.
[8] Günter Hartkopf (1923-1989), State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of the Interior from 1969 to 1983.
[9] International Atomic Energy Agency.
This conversation involved discussing the removal of the fuel cycle from the agreement, the lands delivering nuclear material to Iran, the continuation of work outside of Iran, physical protection during delivery, and information about a conference in London.
Associated People & Organizations
Associated Places
Associated Topics
Document Information
Source
Original Archive
Rights
The History and Public Policy Program welcomes reuse of Digital Archive materials for research and educational purposes. Some documents may be subject to copyright, which is retained by the rights holders in accordance with US and international copyright laws. When possible, rights holders have been contacted for permission to reproduce their materials.
To enquire about this document's rights status or request permission for commercial use, please contact the History and Public Policy Program at [email protected].