Michael Boas Pedersen: Neither Confirming Nor Denying

In 1957 the Danish government had chosen to take a special stand within the NATO alliance by banding the presence of nuclear arms upon Danish soil. The article discusses the problems this policy created for the Danish government in connection with US naval visits from 1961 to 1972. The Americans refused consequently to compromise the Neither Confirm nor Deny policy, and made it very clear to the Danes, that they were disposed to cancel all naval visits, if the Danes demanded clear answers about the presence of nuclear arms onboard US vessels. In fear of jeopardizing Danish security, which was partly based on the nuclear deterrent, the Danish government avoided to confront the Americans with the ban on nuclear arms policy in connection with US naval visits. This article clarifies an interesting fracture between the political intentions and the manoeuvrable limits of the Danish foreign policy on the issue of banding nuclear arms.