No. 184 NAI DFA Ottawa Embassy D/3
Circular by the Department of External Affairs signed by Seán Nunan
'Documentation regarding attitude towards NATO'
(305/72/5) (D.C. Circular No. 4/53)
Dublin, 20 March 1953
- In connection with a recent request from one of the Offices abroad, the Minister directed that when an enquiry is received as to Ireland’s attitude to NATO the enquirer should be given a copy of the attached excerpts from statements made by the Taoiseach.1
- The Minister, when giving this direction, pointed out that the Notes sent by the previous Government to the United States Government in 1949 do not accurately represent the present Government’s attitude to NATO, as indicated by the attached excerpts.
- It will be observed from these excerpts that, notwithstanding the Taoiseach’s general endorsement of the previous Government’s unwillingness to support NATO so long as Partition subsists, his statements emphasise the impossibility of ascertaining at the present time the normal reactions to the Atlantic Pact of the Parliament of a united Ireland.
There is no such emphasis laid in the Irish Notes of 1949 (published in White Paper P, No. 9934) which, indeed, might be said to pre-judge the policy towards NATO of a 32-county legislature and government. (See especially paragraph 2 of the Irish ‘Aide-Mémoire’ of the 8th February, 1949).2
- Offices abroad may retain for record purposes such copies of the relevant White Paper of 1949 as they now possess.
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