19. Diary Entry by the President’s Press Secretary (Hagerty)1
In at 8:00. Went in to see the President after the press conference staff meeting. I told him that I had been thinking about what the message might contain and that while I thought Foster probably might be right, I had also thought overnight of several other things it could be. Among these were: (1) A request by Bulganin and Khrushchev to visit this country following their visit to England; (2) A seeming acceptance of some phases of the President’s “Open Sky” program with a lot of strings attached; (3) A statement to the [Page 46] President that the Russians would agree with the United States to call off all thermo-nuclear tests.
The President said that he thought that those could also be considered as possibilities and then he smiled calmly and said, “Well, we’ll know the answer in a few hours.” He told me to call Dulles and tell him to be on hand in his office before the Soviet Ambassador arrived at the White House.
When we returned from the press conference, the President had an appointment with Clare Booth Luce and Dulles arrived in Shanley’s office about 11:20. Zaroubin arrived at the White House at 11:25 and pushed his way through a horde of photographers and reporters at the main entrance of the Executive offices without any comment. He was accompanied by John Simmons who escorted him to the conference room. I met him there and told him the President would be with him in a few minutes. He said he was glad to see me and that he had not seen me since Geneva. I replied that I was glad to see him. We were in the conference room with Alexander Logofet, the State Department interpreter. Clare Booth Luce came out in a few minutes, and Dulles went into the President’s office.
Promptly at 11:30 Zaroubin was brought in with John Simmons to the President’s office, the interpreter accompanying them. Simmons then left the office, and the President and Dulles conferred with Zaroubin.
(See memorandum of conversation supplied by the State Department.)2
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