Description of a meeting between Sonnenfeldt and Jean-Laurens Delpech, French Minister of Armaments. Delpech was concerned about the slow response to the French requests for further nuclear assistance. Sonnenfeldt explained that they were awaiting a detailed technical analysis of the requests and limitations of US policy. Delpech also raised the issues of French use of the Nevada Test Site. Attached to the memorandum is a handwritten letter by Delpech to National Security Advisor Brent Scowcroft.

Description of conversation between Sonnenfeldt and Jean-Laurens Delpech, French Minister of Armaments, on October 7. Delpech asked about the status of US nuclear assistance to France. He specifically asks about French requests for testing of reentry vehicle material in US nuclear tests, the importation of advanced computers, technical assistance with booster trigger design, and information on submarine vulnerabilities. Other topics included the French sale of helicopters to China and the potential sale of ECM equipment to Arab states.

When meeting with the French Defense Minister Kissinger is to stress how much the U.S. has supported France despite negative views on such assistance by European countries and by Congress, and that this president could not be more sympathetic to French needs. The NSSM 175 review of the policy towards France is attached, and it reviews previous aid given to France, complications that arouse due to restrictions on such aid, and what the French are now requesting. It extensively reviews missile assistance, nuclear safety exchanges, and other French aid issues. The second part addresses the issue in light of U.S.-European political relations, and the effect any such aid might have on such relations. It notes that future French aid might be given to hardening technologies, and to aiding in Poseidon information, and to underground nuclear testing, and it weighs the pros and cons in the eyes of the British. It concludes with an overview of how such aid could be in the interest (or not) of the U.S., but several parts of the last part of this document are blacked-out, marked for secrecy.