77. Telegram From the Central Intelligence Agency to the Station in the Congo1
Washington, March 3, 1961,
2040Z.
Dir 27978 (Out 79749). 1. At high level policy meeting2 three March KUBARK received reaffirmation of authority to expend funds both to bribe [name not declassified] forces and supplement pay of selected [Mobutu] forces where needed to assure loyalty.
2. Sense of meeting was that KUBARK could be fairly liberal in these actions when best judgment recommends them. It was recognized at best there would be some slippage.
3. Again urge you canvass all means for using funds securely and effectively for these purposes.
End of message.
- Source: Central Intelligence Agency Files, Job 78–00435R, DDO/ISS Files, Box 1, Folder 6, [cryptonym not declassified] Ops. Secret; Rybat; [cryptonym not declassified]. Drafted and released by Fields. (C/AF).↩
- On March 3, President Kennedy, Rusk, Dulles, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara and National Security Adviser McGeorge Bundy discussed the Congo at a meeting at the White House from 3:15 p.m. to 5:15 p.m. Department of State Counselor McGhee George ’s record of the meeting noted that the group agreed that the CIA was to expedite its “silver bullets” program in the Congo. (See Document 41, Foreign Relations, 1961–1963, volume XX, Congo Crisis, p. 89)↩