Preface

The Foreign Relations of the United States series presents the official documentary historical record of major United States foreign policy decisions and significant diplomatic activity of the United States Government. The series documents the facts and events that contributed to the formulation of policies and includes evidence of supporting and alternative views to the policy positions ultimately adopted.

The Historian of the Department of State is charged with the responsibility for the preparation of the Foreign Relations series. The staff of the Office of the Historian, Bureau of Public Affairs, plans, researches, compiles, and edits the volumes in the series. This documentary editing proceeds in full accord with the generally accepted standards of historical scholarship. Official regulations codifying specific standards for the selection and editing of documents for the series were promulgated by Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg on March 26, 1925. A statutory charter for the preparation of the series was established by Title IV of the Department of State’s Basic Authorities Act of 1956 (22 USC 4351 et seq.), which was added by Section 198 of Public Law 102–138, signed by President George Bush on October 28, 1991.

The statute requires that the Foreign Relations series be a thorough, accurate, and reliable record of major United States foreign policy decisions and significant United States diplomatic activity. The volumes of the series should include all records needed to provide comprehensive documentation of major foreign policy decisions and actions of the United States Government, including facts which contributed to the formulation of policies and records providing supporting and alternative views to the policy positions ultimately adopted.

The statute confirms the editing principles established by Secretary Kellogg: the Foreign Relations series is guided by the principles of historical objectivity and accuracy; records should not be altered or deletions made without indicating in the published text that a deletion has been made; the published record should omit no facts that were of major importance in reaching a decision; and nothing should be omitted for the purposes of concealing a defect in policy. The statute also requires that the Foreign Relations series be published not more than 30 years after the events recorded.

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The volume presented here, which was compiled and prepared as a book manuscript in 1987, meets all the standards of selection and editing prevailing in the Department of State at that time and complies fully with the spirit of the standards of selection, editing, and range of sources established by the statute of October 28, 1991. This volume records policies and events of more than 30 years ago, but the statute allows the Department until 1996 to reach the 30-year line in the publication of the series.

Structure and Scope of the Foreign Relations Series

This volume is part of a triennial subseries of volumes of the Foreign Relations series that documents the most important issues in the foreign policy of the final 3 years (1958–1960) of the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower. This subseries comprises 18 print volumes totaling more than 16,000 pages and 7 microfiche supplements presenting more than 14,000 pages of original documents.

This particular volume presents documentation on U.S. policy toward and relations with the countries of Africa south of the Sahara. Material on North Africa, including the conflict in Algeria, is in Volume XIII, Arab-Israeli Dispute; United Arab Republic; North Africa.

Sources for the Foreign Relations Series

The original research, compilation, and editing of this volume were done in 1981 and 1982 under the Department regulation derived from Secretary of State Kellogg’s charter of 1925. This regulation prescribed that the Foreign Relations series include “a comprehensive record of the major foreign policy decisions within the range of the Department of State’s responsibilities.” The regulation further stipulated that the additional required records “needed to supplement the documentation in the Department” be obtained from other government agencies.

The Department of State’s historians have had, for the series in general and for the particular volume published here, complete and unconditional access to all records and papers of the Department of State: the central files of the Department; the files of the Department’s Executive Secretariat which comprehended all the official papers created by or submitted to the Secretary of State; the special decentralized files (“lot files”) of the Department at the bureau, office, and division level; the files of all overseas diplomatic and consular posts and U.S. special missions; and all the official correspondence with foreign governments and with other Federal agencies. Any failure to include a complete Department of State record in the Foreign Relations series [Page V] cannot be attributed to constraints or limitations placed upon the Department historians in their access to Department records, information security regulations and practices notwithstanding.

Department of State historians preparing the Foreign Relations series, including the volume published here, have enjoyed full access to the papers of the Presidents and to all other White House foreign policy records. All of this documentation has been made available for use in the preparation of the Foreign Relations series thanks to the exceptional cooperation and support of the National Archives and Records Administration, its Office of Presidential Libraries, and the individual Presidential library. The Department of State owes particular thanks for the research of this volume to the staff of the Dwight D. Eisenhower Library.

In addition to Presidential correspondence and records of Presidential meetings and conversations, the documentation in the White House files at the Eisenhower Library was the most important source for the preparation of the volume published here. Department editors had full and complete access at the Library to all the institutional documentation of the National Security Council (NSC) including the memoranda of discussion at NSC meetings, formal NSC documents, and related papers. There was also full access to the subject files of Presidential records (particularly the Whitman File), the files of other White House officials, and more informal policy documentation in other collections in the Eisenhower Library. It should be noted that the editors supplemented the NSC records from the Eisenhower Library with documents in the Department of State files.

The records preserved and maintained at the Presidential libraries include some of the most significant foreign affairs documentation of other Federal agencies such as the Department of Defense, the Department of the Treasury, and the Central Intelligence Agency. Department of State historians, with the considerable cooperation of the various agencies, have obtained access to records requested for possible inclusion in the Foreign Relations volumes. Access to records of other agencies maintained at the Presidential libraries has been supplemented by special research visits to the historical files retained by these agencies or transferred to the National Archives and Records Administration. Department historians have enjoyed steadily broadened access to the records of the Department of Defense, particularly the records of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

The statute of October 28, 1991, requires that the published record in the Foreign Relations series include all records needed to provide comprehensive documentation of all the major foreign policy decisions and actions of the United States Government. It further requires that government agencies, departments, and other entities of the United [Page VI] States Government cooperate with the Department of State Historian by providing full and complete access to records pertinent to foreign policy decisions and actions and by providing copies of selected records. Although prepared in compliance with an earlier Department regulation, this volume was prepared in a manner fully consonant with the standards and mandates for compilation contained in the 1991 statute.

The List of Sources, pages XIII–XVII, identifies the particular files and collections used in the preparation of this volume.

Principles of Selection for Foreign Relations, 1958–1960, Volume XIV

In selecting documents for the volume published here, the editors have given primary consideration to those records that would most fully explain the formulation of U.S. Government policies toward Africa as a whole and the individual regions and states of Africa. The decisions of and recommendations to the President regarding these policies are fully documented as are the discussions and actions of the National Security Council. The policy options considered or adopted by the Secretary of State and the most important of his actions to implement Presidential decisions are also comprehensively documented.

Correspondence and other exchanges between the U.S. Government and the nations of Africa, nations with interests in Africa, and with the United Nations were included to document the main lines of policy implementation on major issues and to indicate the important items of information that attended Presidential decisions and policy recommendations by the Secretary of State. The editors also included selected intelligence reports and estimates and reports from diplomatic posts that had, or may have had, some impact on the making of major policies.

The editors have not attempted to document the wider range of day-to-day relationships, issues, and contacts between the United States and African nations nor have they sought to present the record of the establishment and conduct of diplomatic and consular posts or the appointments to these posts. The editors also have not researched the files of other Federal agencies in order to provide a comprehensive record of how those agencies contributed to formulation, execution, or support of economic, military, and cultural policies toward the African nations.

In selecting documents for this volume, the editors have concentrated exclusively on presenting previously classified or undisclosed records. Public statements and agreements have not been included, but previously released information has been appropriately identified to elucidate documents printed here for the first time.

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The amount of documentation devoted to Sub-Saharan Africa is substantially larger than in previous volumes of the Foreign Relations series, reflecting the increased attention that U.S. policymakers had to give to the region as many African countries attained independence in the 1958–1960 period. To present U.S. policies toward Africa within one volume, the editors have focused on a selection of the most important issues.

The editors believe that the Congo crisis was the single most important issue in U.S. policy toward Africa in the period; more than half the volume is devoted to the crisis, which began in mid-1960. Another major portion of the volume provides key documentation on U.S. policies toward Africa in a regional context. Those sections include documentation concerning general policy toward Africa, the recognition of newly-independent states, and policy concerning the Horn of Africa. Separate compilations are devoted to Ghana, Guinea, and South Africa, each of which presented policy issues of broad significance. Guinea raised the problem of recognition of a country that had unilaterally chosen independence, when the former colonial power was discouraging international recognition. Delay in U.S. recognition and establishment of diplomatic relations troubled relations with Guinea and demonstrated the futility of such an approach. U.S. relations with Ghana’s President Kwame Nkrumah and Guinea’s President Sekou Touré posed the problem of dealing with left-leaning third-world governments. South Africa, with its system of apartheid, raised policy issues of long-term significance with implications for U.S. policy toward other regimes in southern Africa. Documentation on policies toward other African countries is included in the regional compilations.

A Special Note on Intelligence Documents

At the time the volume was originally compiled, the editors had access to National Intelligence Estimates and Special National Intelligence Estimates at the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Department of State. Other intelligence records in the Eisenhower Library collections and Department of State files were also consulted. These records did not, however, include material concerning the planning and preparation for the possible assassination of Patrice Lumumba described in the Interim Report of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which was based on interviews and on CIA documents that the Agency had made available to the Committee. The editors have identified in editorial notes and footnotes drawing upon documents quoted in the Interim Report the sources currently publicly available on the Lumumba episode.

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Completion of the declassification of this volume and the final steps of its preparation for publication coincided with the development of procedures since early 1991 by the Central Intelligence Agency in cooperation with the Department of State that have expanded access by Department historians to high-level intelligence documents from among those records still in the custody of the Central Intelligence Agency. Some of the documents made available to Department historians were among those quoted in the Interim Report The editors concluded that locating and obtaining access to all the pertinent documentation and submitting it for declassification review would have necessitated considerable further delay in the publication of this volume. They chose not to postpone publication of the prepared manuscript. The Department is, however, using this expanded access, as arranged by the CIA’s History Staff, for compilation of future volumes in the Foreign Relations series.

Editorial Methodology

The documents are presented chronologically according to Washington time. Incoming telegrams from U.S. missions are placed according to time of receipt in the Department of State or other receiving agency, rather than the time of transmission; memoranda of conversation are placed according to the time and date of the conversation, rather than the date the memorandum was drafted. Washington has not been included in the dateline if a document originated there or if a conversation took place there.

Editorial treatment of the documents published in Foreign Relations series follows Office style guidelines, supplemented by guidance from the General Editor and the chief technical editor. The source text is reproduced as exactly as possible, including marginalia or other notations, which are described in the footnotes. Obvious typographical errors are corrected, but other mistakes and omissions in the source text are corrected by bracketed insertions: a correction is set in italic type; an addition in roman type. Bracketed insertions are also used to indicate omitted text that deals with an unrelated subject (in roman type) or that remains classified after declassification review (in italic type). The amount of material not declassified has been noted by indicating the number of lines or pages of source text that were omitted. The amount of material omitted because it was unrelated, however, is not accounted for. All ellipses and brackets that appear in the source text are so identified by footnotes.

The unnumbered first footnote to each document indicates the document’s source, original classification, distribution, and drafting information. The source footnote also provides the background of important documents and policies and indicates if the President or his [Page IX] major policy advisers read the document. Every effort has been made to determine if a document has been previously published, and this information has been included in the source footnote.

Editorial notes and additional annotation summarize pertinent material not printed in the volume, indicate the location of additional documentary sources, provide references to important related documents printed in other volumes, describe key events, and provide summaries of and citations to public statements that supplement and elucidate the printed documents. Information derived from memoirs and other first-hand accounts have been used when appropriate to supplement or explicate the official record.

Declassification Review

The declassification review process for this volume resulted in the withholding from publication of .38 percent of the manuscript as originally compiled. Most of the excisions were of material pertaining to intelligence sources and methods. Others included information given in confidence by foreign officials and material that might be considered offensive.

The Division of Historical Documents Review of the Office of Freedom of Information, Privacy, and Classification Review, Bureau of Diplomatic Security, Department of State, conducted the declassification review of the documents published in this volume. The review was conducted in accordance with the standards set forth in Executive Order 12356 on National Security Information and applicable laws.

Under Executive Order 12356, information that concerns one or more of the following categories, and the disclosure of which reasonably could be expected to cause damage to the national security, requires classification:

1)

military plans, weapons, or operations;

2)

the vulnerabilities or capabilities of systems, installations, projects, or plans relating to the national security;

3)

foreign government information;

4)

intelligence activities (including special activities), or intelligence sources or methods;

5)

foreign relations or foreign activities of the United States;

6)

scientific, technological, or economic matters relating to national security;

7)

U.S. Government programs for safeguarding nuclear materials or facilities;

8)

cryptology; or

9)

a confidential source.

The principle guiding declassification review is to release all information, subject only to the current requirements of national security and law. Declassification decisions entailed concurrence of the appropriate geographic and functional bureaus in the Department of State, [Page X] other concerned agencies of the U.S. Government, and the appropriate foreign governments regarding specific documents of those governments.

Acknowledgements

The editors wish to acknowledge the assistance of officials at the Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, especially David Haight, who assisted in the collection of documents from the Library’s collections for this volume.

Harriet Dashiell Schwar and Stanley Shaloff compiled and edited the volume under the supervision of former Editor in Chief John P. Glennon. Schwar and Shaloff prepared the Congo compilation, Shaloff the compilation on general U.S. policies toward Africa, and Schwar the remainder of the volume. Paul Claussen and David W. Mabon provided planning and direction. General Editor Glenn W. LaFantasie supervised the final steps in the editorial and publication process. Brett Bellamy assisted with the research. Gabrielle Mallon prepared the lists of sources, abbreviations, and persons. Rita M. Baker, Vicki E. Futscher, and Althea W. Robinson performed the technical editing. Barbara-Ann Bacon of the Publishing Services Division (Natalie H. Lee, Chief) oversaw the production of the volume. Do Mi Stauber prepared the index.