The United States, EURATOM and the Early Safeguards Debate

This chapter focuses on the early postwar nuclear policies of the United States. This may seem surprising in a book about EURATOM and nuclear safeguards, but the United States was instrumental throughout EURATOM’s ‘embryonic’ phase as a source of political (as well as later, economic and technical) support. The United States was also the world’s first NWS and a major actor in the early nuclear weapons proliferation debate. As the focus of much of this debate centred on Western Europe, the United States also saw in EURATOM certain non-proliferation potential as well.