Report to Kissinger from the Department of Defense on the legal and policy restrictions preventing U.S. assistance to France's ballistic missile program (mainly National Security Action Memorandum 294). The report also speculates on the specific technical problems the French may have and want assistance with.

Sonnenfeldt summarizes various recent types of military cooperation between the United States and France. These include cooperation on contingency plans for dealing with Germany and US nuclear assistance to France. He suggests that it is time to define the "political philosophy underlying these disparate measures of cooperation."

Summary of US assistance to the French ballistic missile program and nuclear safety talks. Describes assistance given to date and possible areas of expansion.

Laird has made four practical recommendations on how to proceed with French/US nuclear relations. Laird's four points involve information on nuclear effects simulator types, the sale of small simulators, general hardening technology, and/or ABM intelligence. The US has given as much technical assistance as possible thus far within the current guidelines, and it is up to the president to address the issues related to changes in policy to continue the assistance. He is urged to consider especially the impact such aid would have on relations with the UK and the Soviet Union, but we should not cut off all assistance while these issues are being addressed.

Directive from President Ford expanding nuclear safety cooperation with France to include assistance with improving the safety of underground testing. This would involve only information sharing, and "no French nuclear explosive devices of any type may be accepted for test by the US."

Sonnenfeldt worries about documents concerning French nuclear aid passing through so many hands that their security is at risk; Kissinger is to tell Richardson to be as discrete as possible. Richardson has recently sent Galley information on the new areas of U.S. aid to France and of the talks that will be used to implement such aid. He informs Galley that we are willing to go ahead on the four areas recommended by his predecessor Laird: information on nuclear effects simulators; sales of small simulators; hardening technology; and ABM intelligence.

Kennedy sends Hyland a review of the current status and future prospects of French aid as drafted by Denis Clift, as well as a summary of Dr. Foster’s most recent meeting with the French where they discussed new areas of cooperation. It also discusses the advantages if the French were to implement a missile warning system, and how French assistance might be a useful bargaining tool for the U.S. especially when it comes to improving French-European relations.

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.

Sonnenfeldt summarizes the options for providing France with more advanced computers and missile assistance, recommending "a minimal response."

Kissinger summarizes the issues and options involved in three areas of potential aid to the French: 1) advanced computers, 2) technical assistance for their ballistic missile program, and 3) nuclear safety. He makes recommendations for each of the three areas, suggesting limited assistance for the first two.