Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961–1963, Volume VII, Arms Control and Disarmament

270. Editorial Note

In a memorandum to the President of April 3, 1963, Robert Kennedy stated that he had that afternoon received from Ambassador Dobrynin a message of about 25 pages that was “ostensibly to me from the Ambassador” but in fact “from Khrushchev to the President.” Kennedy returned the document to Dobrynin because “it was so insulting and rude to the President and to the United States that I would neither accept it or transmit its message” and told Dobrynin that if the Soviet Union had a message “of that kind to deliver it should be delivered formally through the State Department and not through me.”

The Attorney General did, however, summarize the message in his memorandum. The portion of the summary dealing with the test ban reads:

“Mr. Khrushchev knew that President Kennedy has children and is concerned about the future. He, Mr. Khrushchev, has children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. He is also concerned about the future. It should be clearly understood, however, that the Soviet Union will not go above their offer of two or three inspection sites. There was absolutely no need to go above that figure as our scientists had clearly demonstrated.

“There could not be a secret testing without the other country knowing about it. We knew every time the Soviet Union tested as they knew every time we tested.

“As for obtaining the approval of the United States Senate for a treaty which contained provisions for only two or three sites, if President Kennedy wanted to put his prestige on the line and make the necessary effort, ratification could be obtained. Mr. Khrushchev was tired of hearing first about objections from the Senator from Connecticut and then objections from the Senator from Arizona.

“The United States is run by capitalists who are interested only in war profits. They are the ones that were dictating policy. If President Kennedy was not as concerned about the Rockefellers and these capitalists then he would take this step for world peace.

“Further, who did we think we were in the United States trying to dictate to the Soviet Union? All that was needed were two or three inspection sites and we were trying to obtain a greater number in order to commit espionage. In these efforts we were treating the Soviet Union as inferiors—as if we could dictate to them. The United States had better learn that the Soviet Union was as strong as the United States and did not enjoy being treated as a second class power. (Virtually, these same words were repeated later on in the letter. This was the thread or theme that ran through the whole document.)”

Other topics treated in the summary were alleged U.S. harassment of Soviet shipping, U.S. policy toward Cuba, and deployment of U.S. Polaris submarines to the Mediterranean. Text of this portion of the summary is printed in volume XI. “At the end of the document it said that Mr. Khrushchev had felt in the past that this confidential exchange had been helpful but he said it had not been used lately because of the provocative statements that had been made by representatives of the United States Government which were offensive to the Soviet Union. However, if President Kennedy wanted to reopen this area of contact he would be glad to accept it. He also said that as far as a meeting between Khrushchev and President Kennedy he thought that that might be helpful. This was, however, left in rather enigmatic terms.” (Department of State, Presidential Correspondence: Lot 77 D 163, Kennedy-Khrushchev 1963)

In an April 5 memorandum to Rusk, Thompson speculated on possible causes and motives for Khrushchev’s message in a context depicting Khrushchev as being under strong pressure from the Soviet military after a series of foreign policy setbacks. A possible cause relating to disarmament was that “Soviet military may have reluctantly agreed to three atomic test inspections under pressure from Khrushchev who may really have believed this would achieve agreement.” As one of many possible motives, Thompson stated: “He may be using this message to bring about a Summit or high-level meeting to deal with the points listed above as well as other issues such as a test ban in order to decide how to handle his Chicom problem.” (Ibid.)