THE ACTING SECRETARY'S ANALYTICAL STAFF MEETING MONDAY, JUNE 17,
1974 — 3:00 P.M. SECRETARY'S CONFERENCE ROOM
PRESENT:
THE ACTING SECRETARY — MR. SISCO
Ambassador Brown
Ambassador McCloskey
Ambassador Stevenson
Mr. Aldrich
Mr. Springsteen
Mr. Ingersoll
Mr. Stabler
Mr. Easum
Mr. Sober
Mr. Buffum
Mr. Pollack
Mr. Vest
Mr. King
Governor Holton
Mr. Blake
Mr. Lewis
Mr. Blaney
Mr. Grove
Mr. Moore
Mr. Blow
Mr. McIntyre
Mr. Sober
[Omitted is material unrelated to Moore's discussion of
Pacific archipelagos.]
There have been two issues particularly, sub-issues, within the straits
negotiation, that if we could resolve would make it a great deal easier
to achieve our objectives. One of those is the archipelago problem; the
states such as Indonesia, the Philippines and Fiji, which have opposed
the notion of transit through straits, largely because they are
archipelagos, which itself includes a large number of straits used for
international navigation. Indonesia is the best example of that, with
Lombok and Sunda, and a number of other straits through the archipelago,
as well as Molucca, which of course is outside the archipelago, but also
a very vital strait.
We have felt that if we could work out an accommodation within the
multilateral setting with the archipelago states, so that we would agree
to support a reasonable archipelago principle in return for the kind of
transit through the archipelago which we needed, and in return for
support on their part for the straits position of the United States,
that we would be able to swing one of the major groups in opposition
over to support, and it would be a very major boost to achieving our
straits objective.
As a result, we have been engaged in active negotiation with Indonesia
and the Philippines primarily, but Fiji, because it has some influence
within this archipelago group over the others. We have gone to Jakarta
with a team about four weeks. We then held a second round of discussions
here in Washington about two weeks ago, followed by a visit to Manila
and discussions in New York with the representatives of Fiji, all of
this being carefully coordinated with the other members of the Group of
Five, so that at every stage they knew basically what we were doing and
they knew the kind of response we were getting from the other
archipelago states.
Basically we have told them that we are willing to accept the archipelago
principle and work actively to include a chapter in the convention on
this, if they will agree, one, to a definition reasonably limiting the
concept to basically five or six states including Indonesia, the
Philippines, Fiji; secondly, that they would permit unimpeded transit
through archipelago sea lanes, that would be broad sea lanes through the
archipelagos, including submerged transit, overflight, and no
requirement of notification for the transit through the archipelago.
MR. SISCO: What you are
really saying is, when you talk about the principle that is involved
here — what you really trying to do is to get them to accept our basic
position, really, of unimpeded transfer through and over.
MR. MOORE: Exactly.
And it is perfectly consistent — if they accept it through the
archipelago, for them to accept it in straits and be willing to work for
it there as well.
[Omitted is material unrelated to Moore's discussion of
Pacific archipelagos.]
1 Source:
National Archives, RG 59, Transcripts
of Secretary of State Kissinger’s Staff Meetings, 1973–1977, E5177, Box 3.
Secret.