Office of the Historian

288. Memorandum From Peter Jessup of the National Security Council Staff to the Presidentʼs Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy)1

Washington, October 29, 1964.

SUBJECT

  • National Security Action Memorandum No. 3112

You have asked for a sit rep on the committee established by NSAM 311. My present judgment is that it has bogged down, not because of personality differences and interagency disagreements, but rather because of unresolved technical problems which prevent the accurate judgment factor from being applied.

These amount to:

a.
gaps remaining in the factual information available regarding advanced aircraft capabilities. (Thompson will try to shake an interim report loose from McCone on this problem.)
b.
a disagreement as to whether satellites can, by themselves, provide adequate coverage. NRO said no for some time but is revising this opinion. (This will go back to USIB.)
c.
It has not been determined whether the JCS will permit the most sensitive ECM techniques to be used in peacetime reconnaissance U-2ʼs over Cuba.
d.
Agreement does not exist as to whether a mix of surveillance methods is advisable or not. DOD favors this.
e.
Ambassador Thompson advocates a reaffirmation of UN ground inspection in Cuba.

Another factor may be that Ambassador Thompson, a reflective thinker out loud, may lack the two-fisted authoritarian approach required to hammer out the kind of a paper you want from this committee consisting of Tom Hughes, Kitchen, Weiss and Lindjord for State, Manuel Ray Cline for CIA, and Brig. Gen. John Vogt and Alvin Friedman of Defense.

When I can catch Ray Cline I will get additional insight.

I would recommend that the work of this committee be further refined now that the election period is over. In other words, the question should be can we live after November 4th with any degree of lessened [Page 690] assurance. The committee should dispense with such matters as what to do after a shootdown, etc. etc. and concentrate on what are the minimal requirements and what are the minimal means to dissatisfy these. Our 303 Committee could generate the answers to the technical problems by direct orders. These are the problems which have the NSAM committee floundering. The time is getting short; the UN may debate the matter before we have your paper.

Peter Jessup 3
  1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Cuba, Overflights, Vol. I, 1/64–1/65. No classification marking.↩
  2. Document 277.↩
  3. Printed from a copy that bears this typed signature.↩