ABSTRACT
Even \\hile support for the Eisenhower administration started to wane by the late 1960s. it remained determined to ti-tlstrate the SO\iets from gaining any adnll1tage tt'om US trade. The National Security Council members at their meeting of 21 September 1960 agreed that US nationals must be stopped from selling industrial processes which. while not embargoed by inclusion in the Department of Commerce list. would only mh'antage the Soviets. President Eisenhower \\as interested in tapping some of the So\iet"s gold supply to replace the outfkm of US gold caused by the imbalance in trade with comments that fe\\ of his colleagues would have endorsed. Gold. he declared. was almost a 'strategic materiel" and he '\\,ould be \villing to ship almost any commodity to the USSR if we could recei\'e gold in return. since gold was an important c1cment in our economic strength·. ' In his last months of office, Under-secretary of State Dillon faced the Europeans at the Paris CoCom meeting on 30 October in which he sought to add five new items and stop the removal of five existing items that included navigation and radar equipment, radio communications equipment and telephone cable. Despite the US officials insisting that these five items would be used by the Soviets for early warning in their air defence system, the French demanded that the embargoes be lifted. The US refused to budge and the status quo remained, resulting in there being neither list deletions nor additions."
