57. Memorandum From Robert Komer of the National Security Council Staff to President Johnson1
Chet Bowles is back full of vim and vigor. He’s quite optimistic about the new Shastri cabinet, which he sees as more practical and less woolly-minded than Nehru’s. You should get his slant.
The chief pending item of Indian business is whether we should include in our longer term military program an air defense package designed to preempt their MIG deal with Moscow. Proposal is that we offer to sell or grant India (within proposed MAP ceilings—so no added cost to us): (a) 72 surplus F–6As; (b) help in making their own homegrown HF–24 supersonic; and (c) if HF–24 doesn’t pan out, we’d provide 24–36 F–104s a few years from now; all this only on condition that India give up MIG-21 production.
Most of us are convinced that India is much too far down the road to renege on MIG deal (only Bowles differs—and he’s climbing down now too). Thus we’d get all the political benefit of showing the Indians they’re not second-class citizens (i.e. we’re willing to give F–104s to them as well as Paks) without ever having our offer taken up. Or, if we were all wrong, and Indians bit, then we have the great plus of getting non-aligned India to reject MIGs. This would also protect the Paks, since a few squadrons of Indian F–104s would be less dangerous than a whole MIG production line.
McNamara has come around to buying this deal. He says let’s offer F–104s to both India and Pakistan or to neither. State, however, is more equivocal; it sees an air offer to India as upsetting the Paks just when Ayub is coming around to a conciliatory policy. So State says let’s hold off awhile (see their brief attached).2
But one of the factors bringing Paks around (aside from Nehru’s death) is that we’re finally getting through to them that they can’t have a veto on our Indian policy. Also this air offer is a non-starter anyway, so why all the worry? At any rate, you might hear argument from Bowles, and then take issue up at lunch if you see a case.3
Only other issue is State’s proposal you give Shastri an open-ended visit invite. I told them you couldn’t do this before election, but [Page 126] suggest instead you allow Bowles to tell Shastri this, and to say that if elected you’d much look forward to seeing him at some mutually convenient time thereafter.4
- Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, India, Vol. III, Cables, 6/64–11/64. Secret.↩
- Not printed. The brief on the air defense assistance package took the form of a June 16 memorandum from Talbot to Rusk, passed to the White House.↩
- No record of Bowles’ meeting with President Johnson has been found.↩
- A handwritten note by Talbot on the June 16 memorandum to Rusk cited in footnote 2 above indicates that President Johnson discussed this issue with Bowles on June 15 and authorized him to tell Shastri that if the November elections went well Johnson hoped that he and Shastri would find the opportunity to meet.↩
- Bundy initialed below Komer’s signature.↩