Office of the Historian

112. Memorandum From Robert W. Komer of the National Security Council Staff to the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy)0

Washington, March 19, 1962.

McGB:

Bowles worth reading on US policy toward Afghanistan1 (after he returns next Thursday I presume he’ll want to talk with JFK on several such matters).

He makes a powerful case for major US effort to compete with Soviets, e.g., $150 million in development aid over next five years, developing alternative Iranian transit route, and some passenger and cargo aircraft pronto. He justifies all this by stressing the critically adverse effect: on our positions in Iran and Pakistan if Afghans slip behind the Curtain.

Big problem is not whether to invest this much in gamble to keep Afghan free. It is whether to do so until transit issue resolved and Afghans calm down on Pushtunistan. So long as they press this, they tend to force us to back our Pak allies, thus forcing Kabul in turn to rely even more on Bloc support.

Ayub of course advocates scaring Afghans; while granting that if Afghans fell under Soviet control, Iran would soon follow and Pakistan would be in serious difficulty, he thinks Daud will open his eyes to this threat only if West steps back a bit and causes him to feel pressure of full Soviet embrace. Bowles argues that such a policy would merely thrust Afghans even more rapidly into Soviet hands. It is remotely possible that Ayub (a Pathan himself) may have a better idea of how to play his countrymen than we do.

Regardless of this alternative, however, we ought to face up to Afghan aid question shortly, perhaps even using aid prospect directly as lever toward resolving transit impasse. I’ve talked with Talbot, but you may also want to raise at Planning Lunch.

Bob K.
  1. Source: Kennedy Library, National Security Files, Meetings and Memoranda Series, Staff Memoranda, Robert W. Komer, 3/62. Secret.↩
  2. Reference is to the assessment of U.S. policy toward Afghanistan that Bowles sent from Karachi after his visit to Afghanistan. (Airgram A-359 from Karachi, March 6; Department of State, Central Files, 611.89/3-662)↩