Office of the Historian

340. Memorandum From the Counselor of the Department of State (MacArthur) to the Secretary of State1

Washington, May 9, 1956.

Mr. Secretary: I talked to Captain Wagner (Defense member of our Omega Group) regarding the Mediterranean stockpiling project this morning. I said that in the light of the President’s approval of the concept2 and your satisfactory discussions with Mr. Lloyd in Paris,3 we should now draw up the necessary instructions to put us in a position rapidly to implement the stockpiling project if it were later decided so to do.

In essence, this means:

1.
Ordering now an additional AKA (attack cargo ship), loaded with the arms for the Arabs, to be attached to the 6th Fleet. This will take at least several weeks since the arms will have to be released from US reserves and assembled dockside before the AKA proceeds to the Mediterranean.
2.
Informing General Gruenther and our people in Europe that plans should be made for the delivery of twenty-four F–86’s to Cyprus should they be ordered to deliver the planes there.
3.
Stockpiling in Italy (Naples or Leghorn) the spare parts and ammo for the F–86’s.

All these preparatory steps are necessary if we are to be in a position to implement the President’s statement that we would aid a victim of aggression.4However, the ultimate possible destination of this equipment would not be divulged, and the AKA with its arms aboard, the stockpile of spare parts in Italy, etc., would be portrayed as an additional unit to the 6th Fleet and routine reserve stockpiles for US forces in the Mediterranean area.

In order for Captain Wagner to be able to make rapid progress in Defense, it would be most helpful if you would call Admiral Radford5 and Gordon Gray to say that on your instructions MacArthur has asked Captain Wagner to draw up a plan on which we could get started in the immediate future to have the arms and [Page 627] equipment, etc., available in the Mediterranean area in the event we wish to implement “Project Stockpile”.6

You have already received the President’s approval of the concept, but just as soon as we have the operational plan outlined by Defense, you might inform Admiral Radford that you would want to go over the implementing steps with the President before proceeding. In such a meeting with the President, you would have along Admiral Radford or Gordon Gray.

D MacA
  1. Source: Department of State, S/S–NEA Files: Lot 61 D 417, Omega #1, Top Secret; Omega. The source text bears a notation that Secretary Dulles saw the memorandum.↩
  2. See Document 319.↩
  3. See Document 334.↩
  4. See footnote 2, Document 258.↩
  5. Dulles telephoned Admiral Radford at 3:44 p.m., May 9, to discuss this project. (Memorandum of telephone conversation; Eisenhower Library, Dulles Papers, General Telephone Conversations)↩
  6. The next day, May 10, Dulles sent similar letters concerning implementation of “Project Stockpile” to Radford and Gray. See Document 342.↩