amh'z 6f D31 DEULASSIFIED a 4r coaxial - I am rl - no 3 mhurm- In-i'r- I-I ail Embassy Paris France January 11 SECRET Dear Russ I returned from a brief but delightful ho iday in Eerchtesgaden and environs in time to catch only 1 neas the last stage of General Norstad s review of he I staff paper prepared in answer to the question posed by Congressman Holifield and Mr Hamey I hop that the information sent from this office on the ma ner of handling these inquiries has been sufficient to enable the Department to assert its prerogative in joining with Defense to determine the propriety releasing the information contained in the The preliminary memorandum of your December 29 conversation with JUAE members and staff thought fully pouched to us by Jake arrived in time to be of considerable help in the final polishing of General Norstad's report it several points the responses were sharpened by virtue of awareness of the Dommit tee's current thinking I am enclosing a copy of a memorandum by Bill Hamilton that will indicate some of the General s preliminary reactions to the uncleared record of this meeting You will be especially interested in the final paragraph and I feel sure that the need for great discretion in its use will be immediately apparent I assume that your query of December 2 concerns the transcript of the JCAE meeting with General Norstad at SHAPE The recent evidence that State and Defense Russell Fessenden Director foice of European Regional affairs Department of State Washington SECRET DECLASSIHED rearm REP-PDEIJLEIJ AT THE HMIGHAL 5' th Alum e1 earn them 'nw m are sharing the same problems with respect te meeting the Cemmittee e deeiree hee remeved General Hereted'e early ebjeetien and General Leper hee eeknewledged Hereted'e requeet that eepy be te yeu SincerelyI Raymund L Thureten Eneleeure he eteted SECRET DECLASSIFIED RENEWED SECRET lb January 1G 1961 MEMBRANDUM FOR THE HEGDHD Subject General Norstad's Comments on December 29 Hosting I passed the uncleared memorandum of conversation covering the December 29 meeting between State Depart- ment officials and members in the staff of the JGAE to General Norstad for his personal usel in advance of his review of the staff papers prepared in response to the questions posed to him by the Committee following the recent European tour The General read out extracts of this memorandum at the first of two meetings held to review staff papersI which took place on January 5 Present were Generals Moore JohnsonI Goiner and Eondley Golonels Downey and Taylor and myself General Norstad stated that he was disposed to answer directly and politely -the questions put to him by the CommitteeI attempting to deal both with specific points and with evident miau understandings He instructed Golonel Taylor to deal with the Committee on this basis during his forthcoming consultation in hashington uring the review session the December 29 meeting These related to Question 1 in the JGAE requests in response to which he added a section designed to illustrate the reality of the European contribution to Question 3 the response to which was sharpened and Question A for which he over-armed in the view of another He observed that the complaints about inadequate flow of restrictedchta represented a complete reversal of the Committee s original intent at the beginning of the tour which had been to determine that there was lanness in the security SECRET sts L111 Hm I DECLASSIFIED 1 asset-eta te THE HM me mam Es gum seeker gg lg A number ef the specific incidents reperted by the staff in its acceunt ef the Eurepean trip need net have disturbed the Gemmittee in the view had it been in pessessien ef cemplete er cerrect facts Celenels Eennet and Tayler whe served as escert efficers during the trip and whe are being called te Washingten te censult with the Cemmittee in the pre paratien ef its final rcpert are familiar with these incidents and in mest cases have the infermatien necessary te give a cemplete explanatien ef the circumstances Fer example 1 The allegatien page 10 cf the recerdJ that a U S custedian at a British Canberra base was unaware ef his instructiens The individual in questien was a guard net a custedian and when Celenel Bennet and ene member ef the JCAE staff tested his reactien by attempting te strell casually teward the leaded plane they were immediately stepped 2 The allegatien that twe yeung guards at a site near the Bulgarian berder recently went eut ef their heads page ll The enly pessibly related eccunwuce which EUGUM can identify was the recent transfer ef twe guards en medical greunds as a preventive measure when a I review e rceerds miscle Lu ycsulhlr nvuretic tendencies 3 The allegatien page 12 that at the time ef the Turkish eeup General Nerstad had twice almest erdercd the evacuaticn ef atemic weapcns The fact is that the Cemmittee while in Turkey had asked what precautienary measures had been taken at the time ef the ceup and was infermed matter ef factly that the rcutinely prepared centingency plans fer such an evacuaticn had been reviewed in reutine fashien te make sure that they were up te date General had neither erdered ner been aware ef this review a General Herstad had net been aware ef the Italian refusal te permit a Turkish familiarisetien visit te sites in Italy page It He cemmented that he was sure such a visit ceuld have been arranged had he knewn ef the request and had the prepesal been handled preperly SECRET cEcmssiHED Jazs iai a1 was Diem scar-emcee AT THE mews-'5 SECRET -3- General indicated acme unhappiness with statements attributed tc State representatives in the reccrd cf the December 29 meeting The first is the asserticn that precurement cf additicnal missiles by the allies was a ccnditicn cf cur cffer tc ccmmit the five Pclaris submarines page It is General Harstad's interpretaticn that althcugh the permanent ccmmitment cf the five submarines wculd be ccnditienal cn such additicnal the December cffer cf the initial allccaticn was net as ccnditicned SecendlyI he is unhappy ever the state ment page 5 that the additicnal cf wculd be sea-barns He ccmmented that he felt this was the blind in the Pclaris ccnsiders the mined crews infeasible and since it is the S in eave ts cr na- Lass leaeibiil r 1 n' fees dead- He cbserved further thatihe dues nct lf ewthe idea sf many Pclaris submarines wandering abcut the ecean area He ccnsiders it preferable to leave the submarines essentially under U S ccmmand andI believing that the missiles are safer en the grcund he remains tc ccnfining cur thinking sclely tc a sea bcrne deplcy ment Drafted by William G SECRET This document is from the holdings of The National Security Archive Suite 701 Gelman Library The George Washington University 2130 H Street NW Washington D C 20037 Phone 202 994-7000 Fax 202 994-7005 nsarchiv@gwu edu