Press Communiqué North Atlantic Council Paris 12th Oct 1955

Final Communiqué Chairman: Lord Ismay. Synopsis Defence Ministers meet to consider the Annual Review.

Defence Ministers of the North Atlantic Treaty countries have met at NATO Headquarters at the Palais de Chaillot for the past two and a half days to hear reports from the Standing Group and all the NATO Supreme Military Commanders and to exchange views among themselves. The meeting was called as a preliminary to the annual meeting, towards the end of the year, of Foreign, Defence and Finance Ministers, at which one of the principal items on the agenda each year is the consideration of the Annual Review, by which NATO countries together seek to reconcile the military requirements of their common defence with their political and economic capabilities for meeting those requirements. The meeting was primarily for the exchange of information. The Defence Ministers heard statements on the strategic situation and on our defensive arrangements from General Sir John Whiteley (UK), as Chairman of the Standing Group, and from his two colleagues on the Standing Group, General Joseph Lawton Collins (US) and General Jean Valluy (France); from General Alfred M. Gruenther (SACEUR); Admiral Jerauld Wright (SACLANT); Admiral of the Fleet Sir George Creasey, (Commander-in-Chief Channel); Air Chief Marshal Sir John Boothman (Commander-in Chief Maritime Air Channel); General E.E. Partridge (US), representing the Canada-US Regional Planning Group. These statements were followed by a useful exchange of views between the Ministers of Defence, and the Council in Permanent Session was invited to take up many of the points which emerged.