iii)
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any suggestion that it should be brought forward.
The tentative date for a Cabinet decision was suggested by the Cabinet Office. The timing of the
messages to President Ford and Herr Schmidt and the suggested date for opening consultations in Washington take account of the fact that the
Defence Secretary will be meeting his US and German colleagues at the Ministerial meeting of the Nuclear Planning Group on 7/8 November.
Sir E Peck has been consulted about the timing of our presentation to NATO and of our preliminary warning to our Allies.
Whether or not the Americans will be able to agree to the dates we envisage for bilateral consultation remains to be seen: Mr Tickell was told in Washington last week that many of the senior officials who would be concerned would be out of
Washington a good deal in November.
The PUS should put down a marker that in the case of our non-NATO commitments we may in exceptional cases need to say something to allies who press us to tell them about our intentions, before formal consultations begin at the end of November. We should avoid this wherever possible, but if it becomes necessary, the line to be taken should be agreed ad hoc. A case in point is the visit by the Sultan of Oman at the end of this month (see sub- mission by MED).
APPENDIX TO ANNEX A (Draft Statement)
This is based on an FCO draft (the MOD originally
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