Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961–1963, Volume XI, Cuban Missile Crisis and Aftermath

316. Memorandum for the Record⁰

Washington, April 16, 1963.

SUBJECT

• Review of Cuban Operations for the Standing Group of the NSC

Bromley Smith told me today that the “revived” Standing Group of the NSC ¹ would consider Cuba at its first meeting, next Tuesday at 5:00² (the “regular” time will be 10:30 Tuesdays). He said that Cottrell will be asked to prepare a paper to be ready by the close of business this Thursday, the 18th.³ This will be a status report, not an action document. Mr. Smith said Mr. Bundy had asked that he discuss with me the handling of the Special Group input.

I pointed out to Smith that while the members of the Special Group are also members of the Standing Group (with the exception of Harriman who replaces Johnson for State), some of the other Standing Group members have never been exposed to Special Group affairs and the remainder have been only sporadically. We agreed on the desirability of not spreading knowledge of covert operations any wider than absolutely necessary, if we are to preserve the principle of deniability.

I suggested that Cottrell be instructed to put the report on covert operations in a separate annex, and urged that this not be distributed in advance of Tuesday’s meeting, as the basic paper will be. Mr. Smith agreed that this could probably be handled by passing the annex out at the meeting and retrieving it at the end.

Thomas A. Parrott ⁴

0. Source: Kennedy Library, National Security Files, Meetings and Memoranda Series, Standing Group Meetings, 4/16/63. Secret. Drafted by Thomas A. Parrott of the National Security Council Staff.
1. The new NSC StandingGroup was comprised of the following officials: Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Harriman, Deputy Secretary of Defense Gilpatric, Director of Central Intelligence McCone, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Taylor, Attorney General Kennedy, Under Secretary of the Treasury Fowler, Director of USIA Murrow, AID Administrator Bell, Special Counsel to the President Sorensen, and Special Assistant to the President Bundy who served as its chairman. The task of the revived Standing Group was to deal with matters of national security which did not require Presidential determination, a role different from the earlier Standing Group which had been established to organize and monitor the work of the NSC.
2. April 23; see Document 322.
3. Later—In view of the meeting with higher authority scheduled for Friday the 19th, it has been agreed that the covert annex would be more meaningful if prepared after that. Therefore, the deadline for this will be Monday afternoon. [Footnote in the source text. The annex is Document 318. Monday was April 22.]
4. Printed from a copy that indicates Parrott signed the original.