Office of the Historian

262. Telegram From Secretary of State Rusk to the Department of State1

Geneva, July 23, 1962, 5 p.m.

Secto 36. Eyes only Acting Secretary. Reference Tosec 272 believe maximum effort should be made to press serious constitutional discussions with help efficient outside legal advice. Problem about early application of economic or military pressure on Tshombe is that we have no clear position into which we wish to push him. His acceptance Loi Fondamentale is not our target but rather a reasonable constitutional settlement on federal lines. We should not overestimate capacity UN or US to exert pressure in situation where those being pressured could simply withdraw few thousand yards into bush and guarantee chaos. With everything else on our plate we do not need protracted guerrilla fighting in Congo. Why not move fast to present Adoula and Tshombe with a reasonable constitutional settlement and then get behind it. I’m inclined to agree with Hoffacker approach reported Tosec 313 on constitutional [Page 515] matter. If this seems conservative remember I’ve had great skepticism about UN being able or willing to impose political solution by military action. We need a specific solution around which UN, our principal allies and US public opinion can rally.4 Just being impatient with clowns5 is not good enough.

Rusk
  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 770G.00/7–2362. Secret; Niact. Received at 1:21 p.m.↩
  2. Telegram 164 to USUN (Document 261) was repeated to Geneva as Tosec 27.↩
  3. Tosec 31 to Geneva, July 22, summarized developments on a variety of subjects’ including a proposal by Hoffacker for an informal suggestion to Tshombe that he send a letter to Adoula proposing that the commissions agreed upon at Léopoldville should start work and that an additional commission with internationally recognized experts attached should make proposals for a federal constitution. (Department of State, Central Files, 700.00(S)/7–2262) Hoffacker sent this proposal in telegram 158 from Elisabethville, July 22, which reported that two of Tshombe’s European advisers had conveyed word that he was seeking a formula that might be acceptable in Léopoldville. (Ibid., 770G.00/7–2262)↩
  4. Rusk made similar comments at a meeting of a small group of his senior advisers on July 19. Brubeck’s record of the meeting states in part that Rusk “felt that Gullion must be careful not to aim simply at a course and objectives acceptable to Adoula but to a moderate formula viable for all parties in interest which could thus command the support for a program of sanctions and which Tshombe could tolerably accept.” (Ibid., S/S Files: Lot 66 D 147, Secretary’s Small Staff Meetings)↩
  5. Reference is to a statement by U Thant at a press conference in Helsinki on July 20, in which he reportedly referred to Tshombe and the other Katangan leaders as a “bunch of clowns.” See The New York Times, July 21, 1962.↩