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metaphors, not mine). The Unionist leadership
Robinson seemed the was not adept nor sharp. brightest, but at the same time perhaps the most extreme. He realised that the status, quo did not give him power and was looking for the transfer of real authority.
ARMS CONTROL
(c)
(a)
President Bush had been bullish on the idea of a supplies régime before and after the Gulf War; and Biden was aware of the ideas put forward by
His the Prime Minister and by Mr Mitterrand. concern and that of Congress was to find a mechanism to avoid more serious problems in the future. Congress could not dictate a régime: the best they could do was to try to nudge the
He had no Administration in the right direction. particular expectation that his Bill would go forward. His objective was to identify the
The very elements which had to be addressed. minimum was a process by which we informed one another; the maximum was curtailment of supplies.
He was
To the extent that the President pursued these elements, Biden would put his Bill on the back-burner. The important thing was to get action moving quickly on a broad menu. particularly pleased that the Prime Minister had weighed in so strongly. His particular concern was that, unless action was taken over the next six months, the various arms deals in the pipeline, or likely to be concluded, would render meaningless the efforts we were trying to promote. (The Secretary of State outlined our consultations with the United States, how we had held back in public pending the President's Colorado speech, and our approach to the establishment of an arms control regime beginning with transparency and working towards the harmonisation of criteria. We would work hard to get action agreed at forthcoming meetings such as the G7 and hoped to involve the Russians and Chinese for the first time. The Soviet instinct was not to cross President Bush but there was a strong temptation for them to sell the mass of hardware which they had piled up.
RENEWAL OF MFN FOR CHINA
(e)
Biden said that there was no enthusiasm in the Senate for renewal. He detected considerable frustration among his colleagues at events in
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