From the Open Skies proposal of 1955 to the Norstad Plan 1960: a plan too far

A proposal drafted by General Lauris Norstad for the creation of a limited inspection zone in Central Europe and in the Arctic Circle—a proposal that came to be known as the Norstad Plan—evolved out of President Dwight D. Eisenhower's Open Skies proposal. The proposal, based on ideas promoted by Eisenhower's disarmament adviser, Harold Stassen, departed from traditional U.S. disarmament policy. The plan was eventually aborted by West Germany and France, but the document heralded a shift in Eisenhower's disarmament policy. The president was ready to give up the all-or-nothing approach and adopt an incremental approach. To this end, the United States would make concessions that would render U.S. proposals more acceptable to the Soviet Union. The plan adumbrated the conceptual change that paved the way for the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty and the Non-Proliferation Treaty.