For Immediate Release: August 25, 2005
Further information: Brent Carney (617) 514-1662, Brent.Carney@JFKLFoundation.org
Maura Porter
Boston, MA – The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum today announced that it has declassified and made available for research a tape recording of a National Security Council Meeting from May 9, 1963. The focus of the meeting was how to defend India against a possible attack by China.
During this debate, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Maxwell Taylor urge the President to look beyond India and undertake a broader view of how to deal with any substantial Chinese aggression over the next decade. They caution the President that before any substantial commitment is given to India the US should recognize that nuclear weapons would have to be used in a defense of the region.
"The declassification and release of these tapes offer researchers and historians a unique perspective as to the inner workings of the Kennedy White House," said Maura Porter, the Archivist for the Kennedy Library who is responsible for overseeing the declassification of White House tapes. "When one listens to this recording and others at the Kennedy Library, they hear first hand how critical national security matters were debated and discussed. While the minutes (Summary Record) of this particular NSC meeting have been available in written format since 1996, nothing compares to the actual recording of the discussions. They offer listeners a far more accurate account of this moment in history, and allow for the extraordinary experience of being present in the room."
In one exchange heard on the recording, General Maxwell Taylor begins by stating:
"Mr. President, I had hoped before we get too deeply in the Indian question, we take a broader look at where we are coming, the attitude we’re going to maintain versus Red China…. This is just one spectacular aspect of the overall problem of how to cope with Red China politically and militarily in the next decade…. I would hate to think we would fight this on the ground in a non nuclear war."
When President Kennedy again begins discussing the Indian security guarantee, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara returns to the Chinese issue stating:
"Mr. President, I think General Taylor is implying that before any substantial commitment to defend India against China is given, we should recognize that in order to carry out that commitment against any substantial Chinese attack we would have to use nuclear weapons …. Any large Chinese Communist attack on any part of that area would require the use of nuclear weapons by the US, and this is to be preferred over the introduction of large numbers of US soldiers."
Undersecretary of State George Ball reacts by warning how a US policy towards the use of nuclear weapons in Asia might to look to others. Ball states:
"If there is a general appearance of a shift in strategy to the dependence on a nuclear defense against the Chinese in the Far East, we are going to inject into this whole world opinion the old bugaboo of being willing to use nuclear weapons against Asians when we are talking about a different kind of strategy in Europe. This is going to create great problems with the Japanese – with all the yellow people."
Regarding the possible US defense commitment to India and the United Kingdom’s recent hesitation to join the US on this plan, the President asked Secretary of State Dean Rusk why it would be necessary to have the British with us. In response, Rusk echoes an argument found in many foreign policy debates today:
"I think we would be hard pressed to tell our own people why we are doing this with India when even the British won’t do it or the Australians won’t do it and the Canadians won’t do it. We need to have those other flags flying on these joint enterprises."
Researchers should be aware that tape #86 runs 165 minutes, of which 33 minutes is the National Security Council India Meeting. The other meetings on the tape include a Civil Rights meeting (please note that the recording of this civil rights meeting on Birmingham, Alabama was originally opened to public use in the 1980’s); a discussion of NATO issues, including a discussion on military force levels; an overview of International Trade plans and a discussion on Department of State personnel moves.
Approximately 85 hours of meeting tapes remain to be reviewed for declassification prior to release. Processing of the presidential recordings will continue to be conducted in the chronological order of the tapes. Additional tapes will be opened in the near future.
The first items from the presidential recordings were opened to public research in June of 1983. Over the past 18 years, the Library staff has reviewed and opened all of the telephone conversations and a large portion of the meeting tapes. The latter are predominantly meetings with President Kennedy in either the Oval Office or the Cabinet Room. While the recordings were deliberate in the sense that it required manual operation to start and stop the recording, it was not, based on the material recorded, used with daily regularity nor was there a set pattern for its operation.
The tapes represent raw historical material. The sound quality of the recordings varies widely. Although most of the recorded conversation is understandable, most tapes also include passages of extremely poor sound quality with considerable background noise and periods where the identity of the speakers is unclear.
The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library’s Archives include 48 million pages of documents from the collections of 340 individuals, organizations, or government agencies; oral history interviews with 1,300 people; and more than 30,000 books. The Audiovisual Archives administers collections of more than 200,000 still photographs, 7,550,000 feet of motion picture film, 1,200 hours of video recordings, over 7,000 hours of audio recordings and 500 original editorial cartoons.
The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum is administered by the National Archives and Records Administration and supported, in part, by the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation, a non-profit organization. The John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum and the Kennedy Library Foundation seek to promote, through scholarship, educational and community programs, a greater appreciation and understanding of American politics, history, and culture, the process of governing and the importance of public service.
The Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum is open daily from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., with the exceptions of Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day, and New Year’s Day. The Research Room is open 8:30 am – 4:30 pm each weekday, and is closed on weekends and federal holidays. Appointments may be made by calling (617) 514-1629. The recordings and finding guide are available for purchase at the John F. Kennedy Library, Columbia Point, Boston, MA 02125, or by calling the Audiovisual Department (617) 514-1614.
The Library is located in the Dorchester section of Boston, off Morrissey Boulevard, next to the campus of the University of Massachusetts/Boston. Parking is free. There is free shuttle-service from the JFK/UMass T Stop on the Red Line. The Museum is fully handicapped accessible. For more information, call (866) JFK-1960.