21 October 1966: Summary of U.S. Briefing on ABM Deployment

In this summary, American officials shared their thinking on anti-ballistic missile deployment, and informed the Canadians that “no decision to deploy or not to deploy ABMs” had been made. They also discussed the importance of communication with allies.

The Americans also spoke on the topic of the Comprehensive Test Ban and ABMs, and emphasized that an agreement would “rule out all further testing of ABM warheads.” They noted that potential future deployment would have to involve “war head designs available at effective date of test-ban.”

Regardless of this technicality, the Americans contended that Soviet opposition to on-site inspection, not ABM test requirements, was the real barrier to a test-ban agreement.