185. Memorandum From the President’s Special Counsel (Raoul-Duval) to the White House Chief of Staff (Cheney)1

SUBJECT

  • Terrorism

Background

The current Executive Branch mechanism for coordinating U.S. response to terrorism is the Cabinet Committee on Terrorism, chaired by [Page 630] the Secretary of State. The center of gravity of this group’s activities concerns terrorism abroad.

The Cabinet Committee has a Working Group2 which is active and has produced a series of doomsday-type papers showing the potential of substantially increased terrorism activities throughout the world and here in the United States. I personally believe that most of the current rash of news reports on the terrorist potential has been triggered largely by the work of this group.

The Problem

Terrorism will increase worldwide and in the United States over the coming years. It is possible there could be an increase in the United States this year, starting with the 4th of July and continuing through the Presidential election. It is impossible to rule out the possibility of a major terrorist attack in the United States.

The current Executive Branch organization (which was set up by former President Nixon) to combat terrorism, i.e., the Cabinet Committee and Working Group, is not adequate. There should be a reorganization of this effort reflecting the changed circumstances and President Ford’s priorities. The entire effort needs to be geared more to protecting U.S. interests within the United States.

Any action taken by the President in this area is subject to great risk. Anything he does publicly could itself trigger terrorist action, although this is a far-overrated threat. Also, great caution is needed in this area because some of the abuses alleged to have occurred in the Intelligence Community during the late ’60s and early ’70s were in response to anti-terrorist activities. The Attorney General is very concerned about how our foreign intelligence activities to combat terrorism interface with domestic law enforcement responsibilities. Finally, terrorists are very difficult to deal with, and therefore the President can easily appear impotent in any given specific situation.

Recommendation

I think the President should move very quietly to strengthen Executive Branch efforts to combat terrorism. I think he should take action now before a major incident turns this latent problem into a major public issue.

He must, however, move very carefully. One staff recommendation within the NSC is that the President create a Terrorism Special Action Group under the chairmanship of Scowcroft. This may be a good idea.

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I recommend that you call a meeting of the following: Marsh, Buchen, Scowcroft, Cannon and myself. The purpose of this meeting would be to assign action to a very small, in-house (White House staff only) group to develop an options paper for the President.3

  1. Source: Ford Library, Papers of Michael Raoul-Duval, Box 11, Intelligence Coordinating Group Papers, Terrorism. Administratively Confidential. Attached to a memorandum proposing the creation of a Terrorism Special Action Group (TSAG) within the NSC system to provide advice and assistance to the President and “develop decision options related to crises generated by terrorist activities.” The TSAG was to be chaired by Scowcroft and comprised of the Deputy Secretary of State, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, the Deputy Attorney General, the Director of Central Intelligence, and the Director of the Domestic Council.
  2. Created in October 1972, the Working Group was chaired by the Special Assistant to the Secretary of State and Coordinator of the Office for Combating Terrorism.
  3. There is no indication of approval or disapproval of the recommendation. A draft NSDM is attached but was never issued, although an Executive Group on Terrorism was created under the chairmanship of L. Douglas Heck. On July 23, Heck was appointed Special Assistant to the Secretary of State and Coordinator of the Office for Combating Terrorism, elevated to Director with the equivalent rank of Assistant Secretary on August 1. The Executive Group included one representative each from the Departments of State, Justice, and Defense as well as the NSC, FBI, and CIA and held its first meeting on December 1. The substance of that meeting is discussed in a December 3 memorandum from Robert B. Plowden, Jr., of the NSC Staff to Hyland. (National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, NSC Files, NSC Institutional Files (H-Files), Box H–301, Staff and Committees [1 of 3])