Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961–1963, American Republics; Cuba 1961–1962; Cuban Missile Crisis and Aftermath, Volumes X/XI/XII, Microfiche Supplement

355. Memorandum from Rostow to Rusk, October 22¹

October 22, 1962

SUBJECT

• The Crisis

I was called last night to a two-hour White House meeting at 10:15 p.m., chaired by Mac Bundy, to consider problems and steps beyond the President’s speech. The Attorney General, Nitze, Rowen were there, among others. I list briefly below certain concrete ideas which may or may not prove viable. The purpose of last night’s exercise was to surface such possibilities.

In general, I should like to ask your permission to use systematically a part of the time of the members of my Council to develop possible initiatives and courses of action around the world as this crisis develops. It is clear that those with operational responsibility, both military and civil, will be very much tied up with exacting current business; and a tactical reserve of the kind the Council represents could be helpful. If you think this is a useful idea, you may wish to designate someone to whom I should regularly report with these suggestions—preferably yourself, although you may be too hard pressed.

Following are some preliminary notions.

1. Berlin and the Alliance. Until we have evidence to the contrary, we must assume that the new moves in Cuba were designed to force us into action which would weaken or destroy the Alliance basis for a Berlin confrontation. Moves to strengthen the Alliance and to increase the credibility of our Berlin position are, therefore, urgently required:

a. We should consider bringing the three Berlin headquarters under one roof—which the American elements in Berlin, in any case, urgently desire, as I discovered last week.

b. Building on the Four-Power Ambassadorial Group, we should consider bringing to Washington, on an ad hoc Combined Chiefs of Staff basis, some higher level civil and military officers from London, Paris, and Bonn, so that they may directly share in decisions concerning Cuba, Berlin and other areas that may be drawn into the crisis. Wraps should be lifted on information required for them to perform as full members of the team. We are likely to require economic officers as the crisis unfolds, with trade and balance of payments positions affected.

c. We should consider asking de Gaulle to move his armies forward into Germany; and we should be prepared to make certain nuclear concessions to him and—if the Alliance agrees—to the Germans, for the duration of the crisis.

d. Although there are evidently two sides to this, we should think hard about putting some tactical nuclear weapons into Berlin itself, to minimize the likelihood of a Soviet coup de main which, I can attest, Watson fears. We should announce that they would be withdrawn when the crisis was settled.

2. United Nations approach. We should try to dramatize the crisis to the maximum extent possible as not a Cuban crisis but a worldwide Communist thrust with equal danger and interests for all. The Chinese Communist thrust against India increases the credibility of this posture, even though Moscow and Peiping are not working in full harness. If this view is accepted, the weight of the United Nations may strongly be towards calling for no further aggressive moves. We should consult bilaterally with the Indians to this effect. With this United Nations approach in mind, we might consider these two last-minute additions to the speech.

Page 2, add after the first full paragraph the following:

“Let it be remembered: the United Nations Charter allows for regional security arrangements. The nations in this hemisphere have long since decided to exclude the military presence of extra-continental powers.”

Page 8, after the first full paragraph, add the following paragraph:

“These recent moves in Cuba, the threat which overhangs Berlin, the Chinese Communist thrust on the Indian borders, and the dangerous state of affairs in Southeast Asia have brought us close to a situation of general war. This is not merely a matter of Cuba that we now face. I call on all nations and peoples who treasure the peace now to bring their influence to bear to end this crisis promptly and peacefully and in ways which make clear that aggression and blackmail do not pay.”

3. I saw photographs of the missiles in Cuba last night. It occurred to me that one way to get rid of them was by attacking these sites with Lazy Dog. As you may know, Lazy Dog consists of packages of non-explosive pellets (of the kind we used to shoot out of BB guns) which, when dropped in high density, have great penetrating power over a considerable area. This kind of an attack could be mounted virtually covertly and would quickly convert both the missiles and their installations into worthless junk, without a pound of high explosives being used. The Pentagon people will be considering this possibility technically this morning. You may wish to consider it from the point of view of your responsibilities.

1. Possible initiatives and courses of action around the world as the Cuban crisis develops. Top Secret. 3 pp. Kennedy Library, Sorensen Papers, Classified Subject Files 1961–64, Cuba—Subjects, General & Historical Information, 10/20/62–10/25/62.