—
“+

OCT 4 1978
Memo to file: L

Subject: Dr. Kissénger and the BW Initiative
ee

I had a chance to meet Dr. Kissenger at David
Rockefeller's reception for the World Bank at Pocantica
on Sunday, October 1.

I asked him why the administration had taken the
line of a unilateral abrogation of BW rather than offer-
ing to bargain for a mutual commitment with the Russians.
He acknowledged that the Russians "give no credit for past
services rendered". However, he felt that Congress was
likely to take that step anyhow and that in the domestic
ferment about the Vietnam War it was important to be making
some positive steps. This corroborates the general wisdom
of the time and what I wrote in my article.

He appeared quite well informed about the details even
to taking pains to distinguish that it was only BW not CW
that was the subject of that abrogation.

I did not press him on what he thought of the reasons
behind the Soviets eventually agreeing to negotiate the BW
treaty as a mutually binding commitment. (Doubtless that has
to do with the lack of verification that was incorporated

in it and the useful precedent, from their standpoint, that

that posed).