Office of the Historian

432. Memorandum From the President’s Special Assistant (Rostow) to President Johnson1

Washington, April 2, 1967.

SUBJECT

  • Wheat and Oil Agreement for Pakistan

Here is the wheat agreement Gene Locke probably mentioned to you. He is paying his farewell calls2 on Pakistan’s senior economic ministers early tomorrow morning and would like to give them an answer then. This would necessitate getting a cable out to him early this evening. If that’s cutting it too close, we can get it to him easily—if you approve—for his final call on Ayub Friday.3

Charlie Schultze’s memo (attached)4 lays out the figures. In a nutshell, Pakistan has asked us for an added 250,000 tons of wheat now to help break a rapid rise in prices stemming from drought shortages. Freeman and Hall propose 200,000—half to be charged against any FY 1968 US allocation for Pakistan.

I recommend approval. Pakistan has done a sound job in agriculture. Approving this program now would help Ayub with a tough economic-political problem. Even doing this wouldn’t take us beyond average past levels (1.5 million tons) for this year.5

Walt
  1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Pakistan, Vol. VII, Memos, 10/66–7/67. Confidential.↩
  2. Locke resigned his post as Ambassador to Pakistan effective April 16. He was replaced by Benjamin H. Oehlert, Jr., who was appointed on July 27 and presented his credentials on August 16.↩
  3. April 7.↩
  4. Dated April 3, Schultze’s memorandum to the President dealt with the proposed P.L. 480 agreement with Pakistan.↩
  5. Johnson’s marginal handwritten response reads: “OK, for either 200 or 250—I’d give him 250 but notify Locke at once.”↩