The Chairman
Page 109
99. The Times (London), March 14, 1967. McCloy was described in this dispatch as an “ornament of the Establishment.”
100. NYT, April 24, 1967.
101. Ibid., April 29, 1967.
102. Johnson, Vantage Point, p. 311.
103. “The McCloy Visit,” State Department cable, 3/6/67, FOIA.
104. The Reporter, May 18, 1967.
105. “Talking Paper for Mr. McCloy’s meetings with Minister Schiller, Mr. Abs, Governor Blessing, and Minister Strauss: International Monetary Negotiations,” 6/5/67, Treasury Department, FOIA.
106. When the Mansfield Amendment was reintroduced in the spring of 1971, McCloy again lobbied vigorously against any troop reductions, telling Congress: “To those who say that the presence of our troops in NATO simply extends the aspects of the Cold War, precisely because it does confirm and solidify the Alliance, I would simply reply that perhaps at another period in history the Alliance in its present convincing nature would be unnecessary and unproductive, but it is vital now. While it functions in full vigor, it, itself, contributes to the damping down of the cold war.” (John J. McCloy testimony, 5/14/71, LD.)
107. “Report to NATO on Tripartite Talks,” 6/7/67, State Department cable from Paris to secretary of state, DOS FOIA.
108. Frances FitzGerald, Fire in the Lake: The Vietnamese and the Americans in Vietnam (Boston: Atlantic/Little, Brown, 1972), p. 303.
109. Herring, America’s Longest War, pp. 145, 147, 149, 174.
110. FitzGerald, Fire in the Lake, pp. 320, 354.
111. Herring, America’s Longest War, p. 176; The Pentagon Papers (NYT), p. 485.
112. Townsend Hoopes, The Limits of Intervention (New York: David McKay, 1969), p. 57.
113. Secret memorandum of conversation with Secretary McNamara, 10/10/66, AH.
114. Secret memorandum of conversation with Secretary McNamara, 11/26/66, AH.
115. In the spring of 1966, Rostow told Harriman, “The President is going to stick it out. The bombing will escalate.” When Harriman expressed the opinion that one had to be careful that the bombing campaign didn’t eventually place us in a nuclear confrontation with the Soviet Union, Rostow demurred: “Oh, yes,” he said, “we will probably have to get there [to that point] because it is only in extreme crises that some settlement will come.” Such conversations only confirmed Harriman’s worst fears about the advice the president was receiving. (Secret memorandum of conversation with the president, 5/30/66, AH.) Senator Fulbright agreed with Harriman’s assessment of Walt Rostow, calling him the president’s “Rasputin.” (Fulbright to Lew Douglas, 1/9/68, LD.) Townsend Hoopes, the undersecretary of the air force, thought Rostow was a “fanatic in sheep’s clothing.” (Hoopes, Limits of Intervention, p. 61.)
116. Hoopes, Limits of Intervention, pp. 63, 89.
117. Endicott Peabody memo to the president, “John McCloy on Vietnam and the Presidency,” 11/6/67, National Security File, Memos to the President, vol. 53, box 26, LBJ.
118. McCloy to LBJ, 3/16/67, LBJ.
119. Hoopes, Limits of Intervention, p. 90; David Halberstam, The Best and the Brightest, p. 783.
120. Herring, America’s Longest War, pp. 178–79.
121. Top-secret memorandum of conversation with Secretary McNamara, 7/1/67, AH.
122. As late as Oct. 1967, McNamara told reporters at a Pentagon press conference, “I do not know any qualified military observer, national or foreign, who believes that there is a military stalemate.” He felt compelled to maintain the fiction that the war could be won. The hypocrisy of his position led his own wife to observe that year that he was “at war with himself.” (Paul Hendrickson, “Self-inflicted Pain,” WP Magazine, June 12, 1988, p. 23; Hoopes, Limits of Intervention, p. 86.)
123. Lew Douglas to Calvin Plimpton, 10/8/69, LD.
124. Hendrickson, “Self-inflicted Pain,” WP Magazine, June 12, 1988.
125. Myra MacPherson, A Long Time Passing (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1984), p. 145.
126. Halberstam, Best and Brightest, p. 771.
127. Isaacson and Thomas, Wise Men, p. 673.
128. Richard Falk interview, March 28, 1985.
129. Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Bitter Heritage: Vietnam and American Democracy 1941–1968 (Greenwich, Conn.: Fawcett, 1968), p. 124.
130. James Rowe memorandum for the president, 5/17/67, LBJ.
131. John Roche eyes-only memo to the president, 5/26/67, LBJ.
132. Paul H. Douglas to McCloy, 7/28/67, LBJ.
133. Walt Rostow to the president, 10/9/67, LBJ.
134. Henry Cabot Lodge to Walt Rostow with attached “Memorandum Regarding my Several Conversations with Dr. James B. Conant Concerning His Joining the Committee for Peace with Freedom in Viet-Nam,” LBJ; Walt Rostow to the president, 10/9/67, LBJ.
135. McCloy to Henry Cabot Lodge, 10/16/67, LBJ.
136. The “Wise Men” were unaware that McNamara’s disaffection extended far beyond his criticism of the bombing. The day before the “Wise Men” met, McNamara told Johnson of his “belief that continuation of our present course of action in Southeast Asia would be dangerous, costly in lives, and unsatisfactory to the American people.” (McNamara to the president, 11/1/67, LBJ.)
137. Herring, America’s Longest War, p. 184.
138. Neil Sheehan, A Bright Shining Lie: John Paul Vann and America in Vietnam (New York: Random House, 1988), p. 695.
139. George Ball interview, Dec. 4–5,1985; Isaacson and Thomas, Wise Men, p. 680.
140. Endicott Peabody memo to the president, 11/6/67, NSF, Memos to the President, vol. 53, box 26, LBJ.
141. Shoup and Minter, Imperial Brain Trust, pp. 240–41.
142. John J. McCloy to Averell Harriman, with attached speech, “Challenge in Europe,” 2/5/68, AH; see also The Nation, Feb. 5, 1968.
143. The Nation, Feb. 5,1968; NYT, Jan. 13, 1968; Los Angeles Times, Jan. 15,1968.
144. Harriman to McCloy, 2/8/68, AH.
145. Harriman to McCloy, 1/30/68, AH.
146. Tom Johnson notes, daily diary, 1/30/68, LBJ.
147. Herring, America’s Longest War, p. 191.
148. “Memorandum for the Files of Lewis L. Strauss,” 2/5/68, Strauss Papers, AEC Series—McCloy, John J., HH.
149. Herring, America’s Longest War, p. 194.
150. Ibid., p. 204.
151. Harriman appointment diary, 3/25/68, AH. Many historians have mistakenly placed McCloy at this March 26, 1968, “Wise Men” meeting. See Herring, America’s Longest War, p. 206; Halberstam, Best and Brightest, p. 794; Hoopes, Limits of Intervention, p. 215.
152. Lovett soon began echoing McCloy’s argument that Washington was “overcommitted.” In 1968, Lovett told Harriman’s personal assistant that the war had demonstrated that “we had neither the manpower nor the financial ability to support activities all around the world at the rate we were accumulating. . . . I have always believed that you never ought to go to war unless you are prepared to fight full out.” (Confidential interview of Robert Lovett by Mark L. Chadwin, 7/10/68, AH.)
153. Johnson, Vantage Point, p. 417.
154. Isaacson and Thomas, Wise Men, p. 695.
155. CIA memo, “Questions Concerning the Situation in Vietnam,” 3/1/68, LBJ.
156. Herring, America’s Longest War, p. 206.
157. Isaacson and Thomas, Wise Men, pp. 700–701.
158. Herring, America’s Longest War, p. 206.
159. Johnson, Vantage Point, p. 418.
160. Herring, America’s Longest War, pp. 208–11.
161. Lew Douglas to Dr. Calvin H. Plimpton, 10/8/69, LD.
162. Ronald Steel, Walter Lippmann and the American Century, p. 571.
163. Sheehan, Bright Shining Lie, p. 695.
164. Harriman confidential memorandum for personal files, 5/24/67, AH.
165. Mohamed Heikel, The Cairo Documents: The Inside Story of Nasser and His Relationship with World Leaders, Rebels, and Statesmen (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1973), p. 249.
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166. State Department memorandum of conversation, 4/2/68, DOS FOIA.
167. State Department cable, 3/23/68, DOS FOIA.
168. State Department cable, “McCloy and Shah,” 4/1/68; 4/3/68, DOS FOIA.
169. State Department confidential memorandum of conversation, “Highlights of McCloy-Hoveyda Conversation,” 3/31/68; State cable, “Shah reviewed with John McCloy . . . ,” 4/3/68; State cable, “Saudi-Iranian Relations,” 4/1/68, DOS FOIA.
170. State Department confidential memorandum of conversation, “Highlights of McCloy-Hoveyda Conversation,” 3/31/68; McCloy-Mostofi memorandum of conversation, 4/2/68, DOS FOIA.
171. State Department cable, Dhahran to secretary of state, “McCloy Visit to Bahrein,” 4/6/68, DOS FOIA.
172. Eilts cable to secretary of state, 4/10/68, DOS FOIA; Roger P. Davies to Dwight J. Porter, 4/29/68, DOS FOIA.
173. McCloy to Dean Rusk, 4/30/68, DOS FOIA; McCloy to George Ball, 2/17/76 (courtesy of David L. Dileo).
174. McCloy to Dean Rusk, 4/30/68, DOS FOIA; McCloy to George Ball, 2/17/76 (courtesy of David L. Dileo).
175. Lucius D. Battle memo to the secretary, 5/17/68, with attached talking points; Rusk letter to McCloy, 5/23/68, DOS FOIA; McCloy to George Ball, 2/17/76 (courtesy of David L. Dileo).
BOOK SEVEN
TWENTY-SEVEN: THE ESTABLISHMENT AT BAY: THE NIXON-KISSINGER ADMINISTRATION
1. Henry Kissinger, White House Years, p. 944.
2. Harriman was unaware of Kissinger’s perfidy and completely misjudged what Kissinger would do with the national-security-adviser job. On Dec. 4, 1968, he told Robert Kleiman, a member of The New York Times ’editorial board, “Off the record, I think Henry Kissinger is a fine appointment. . . . He won’t try to make this into the same kind of job as Rostow and Bundy did, but will try to coordinate planning, and I think he’ll do it well.” (Harriman-Kleiman telcon, 12/4/68, AH.)
3. At a critical juncture, he called Allen from a phone booth in Paris and warned him that the Johnson administration had negotiated a bombing pause. The tip allowed the Nixon campaign to prepare for the news and encourage the Thieu regime in Saigon to repudiate the Paris negotiations. Three days before the election, Thieu did exactly that, which publicly undermined the chances for an early cease-fire. This in turn dented Humphrey’s late surge in the opinion polls, and may have cost him the narrow election. Kissinger’s information, according to John Mitchell, was “basic.” Richard Allen later told Seymour Hersh, “My attitude was that it was inevitable that Kissinger would have to be part of our administration. . . . Kissinger had proven his mettle by tipping us. It took some balls to give us those tips.” It was, after all, “a pretty dangerous thing for him to be screwing around with the national security.” (Seymour Hersh, The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House [New York: Summit, 1983], pp. 11–22; Stephen E. Ambrose, Nixon: The Triumph of a Politician 1962–1972 [New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989], pp. 196, 208.)
4. McCloy to George Ball, 2/17/76 (courtesy of David L. Dileo); McCloy interview, Sept. 14, 1984; Stephen R. Graubard, Kissinger: Portrait of a Mind (New York: W. W. Norton, 1973), p. 115.
5. McCloy interview, May 26, 1983.
6. Henry Kissinger, White House Years, pp. 22–23.
7. Anthony Sampson, The Seven Sisters: The Great Oil Companies and the World They Shaped (New York: Viking, 1975), pp. 245–46.
8. Kissinger, White House Years, pp. 341, 360–61.
9. Raymond L. Garthoff, Détente and Confrontation: American-Soviet Relations from Nixon to Reagan (Washington, D.C.: The Brookings Institution, 1985), p. 135; John Newhouse, War and Peace in the Nuclear Age (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1989), pp. 216, 222.
10. McGeorge Bundy, Danger and Survival (New York: Random House, 1988), pp. 551–52. Bundy acknowledges that the “destabilizing character of MIRV is not so hard to understand that it was not noticed before it was deployed.” But he argues that the “cause of stopping MIRV never had top priority for more than a few” and makes no mention of McCloy’s vigorous opposition to MIRVing.
11. Kissinger, White House Years, pp. 543, 131.
12. McCloy interview, Dec. 3, 1985. McCloy’s position was supported by the CIA’s estimates, which concluded that the Soviets were not seeking a “first-strike” capability and were not intending to MIRV their new SS-9 missile. Kissinger, however, forced the Agency to change its estimate. (Hersh, Price of Power, pp. 495–97.)
13. Garthoff, Détente and Confrontation, p. 136; Hersh, Price of Power, p. 165; Kissinger, White House Years, p. 540. Kissinger himself, four years later, admitted, “I would say in retrospect that I wish I had thought through the implications of a MIRVed world more thoughtfully in 1969 and in 1970 than I did.” (Newhouse, War and Peace, pp. 222–23.)
14. Strobe Talbot, The Master of the Game: Paul Nitze and the Nuclear Peace (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988), p. 124.
15. Kissinger to McCloy, 12/12/69, NSC FOIA.
16. Hedrick Smith, “Panel Urges U.S. to Yield on Missile Site Inspection,” NYT, Jan. 9, 1971.
17. Hersh, Price of Power, p. 166.
18. McCloy interview, Dec. 3, 1985.
19. Averell Harriman memorandum of conversation, 12/2/70, AH. Harriman was told this by Ed Williams, who had recently lunched with Kissinger.
20. McCloy to Hamilton Fish Armstrong, 2/28/68, PU.
21. Richard Falk interview, March 28, 1985.
22. Minutes of the 153rd annual meeting of the board of directors, 11/4/70, LD.
23. McCloy to Lew Douglas, 1/29/69, LD.
24. Lew Douglas to Bayless Manning, 8/10/72, LD.
25. Richard J. Barnet, Roots of War: Men and Institutions Behind U.S. Foreign Policy (Baltimore, Penguin, 1973), p. 49.
26. Robert D. Schulzinger, The Wise Men of Foreign Affairs: The History of the Council on Foreign Relations p. 209.
27. Ibid., p. 214.
28. Rolland Bushner memo to all committee chairmen, 12/4/69, LD.
29. Richard Falk interview, March 28,1985; Laurence H. Shoup and William Minter, Imperial Brain Trust, p. 46; Schulzinger, Wise Men of Foreign Affairs, p. 211.
30. Richard J. Barnet interview, Dec. 1, 1989.
31. Schulzinger, Wise Men of Foreign Affairs, p. 211.
32. James H. Billington to Bayless Manning, 1/15/73, LD.
33. Francis M. Bator to Bayless Manning, 1/19/73, LD.
34. Richard J. Barnet interview, Dec. 1, 1989. Barnet was first sponsored as a Council member in 1968, by Arthur Dean.
35. Francis M. Bator to Bayless Manning, 1/19/73, LD.
36. Shoup and Minter, Imperial Brain Trust, p. 46.
37. Ibid., pp. 46–47.
38. Schulzinger, Wise Men of Foreign Affairs, p. 242.
39. Ambrose, Nixon, p. 386.
40. Kissinger, White House Years, pp. 942, 944–45.
41. Ibid., pp. 945–46.
42. McCloy to Hamilton Fish Armstrong, with attachment, 5/17/71, PU. McCloy once told James Chace, then the managing editor of Foreign Affairs, “We had no fear of the Soviets at the end of the war. NATO wasn’t constructed merely out of the Soviet threat.” (James Chace interview, March 3, 1982.)
43. Kissinger, White House Years, p. 22.
44. Michael Sterner interview, Aug. 14, 1984.
45. Ibid.
46. Testimony of James E. Akins, 10/11/73, executive session of hearings before the Senate Subcommittee on Multinational Corporations, pt. 5, pp. 1–28; John M. Blair, The Control of Oil (New York: Pantheon, 1976), p. 221.
47. Steven Weinberg, Armand Hammer: The Untold Story (New York: Little, Brown, 1989), pp. 210–13.
48. Secret State Department doc., “Current Foreign Relations,” issue no. 16, April 22, 1970.
49. Sampson, Seven Sisters, pp. 254–55.
50. Secret State Department memorandum of conversation, “Libyan Oil Negotiations,” 9/26/70, DOS FOIA,
51. Confidential and private letter from McCloy to Richard McLaren, assistant attorney general, 7/23/71, Justice Dep
artment FOIA.
52. Private and confidential letter from McCloy to McLaren, 7/23/71, Justice Department FOIA.
53. Justice Department memo, “Business Review Letters Issued in Connection with OPEC Negotiations January-February 1971,” 1/28/72, p. 6, Justice Department FOIA.
54. Dudley H. Chapman memo to Richard W. McLaren, 2/1/71, attached to Justice Department memo on business-review letters, 1/28/72, Justice Department FOIA.
55. Author’s visit to McCloy’s office, May 26, 1983.
56. Senate Multinational Hearings, pt. 5, p. 14.
57. Justice Department memo, “Business Review Letters Issued in Connection with OPEC Negotiations January-February 1971,” 1/28/72, p. 4, Justice Department FOIA.
58. Senate Multinational Hearings, pt. 5, pp. 69–70.
59. Sampson, Seven Sisters, p. 259.
60. Senate Multinational Hearings, pt. 5, p. 263; Sampson, Seven Sisters, pp. 260–63.
61. Senate Multinational Hearings, pt. 5, pp. 265–66.
62. Ibid., p. 265.
63. Ibid., p. 271.
64. Sampson, Seven Sisters, p. 269.
65. McCloy to McLaren, 7/23/71, Justice Department FOIA.
66. Dudley H. Chapman memo to Richard W. McLaren, 8/25/71, Justice Department FOIA.
67. Robert Engler, The Brotherhood of Oil (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977). p. 99.
68. Sampson, Seven Sisters, p. 283.
69. Ibid., p. 279. Sampson is quoting Professor Maurice Adelman, Foreign Policy, Autumn 1972.
70. Robert Sherrill, The Oil Follies of 1970–1980: How the Petroleum Industry Stole the Show (and Much More Besides) (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor-Doubleday, 1983), p. 145.
71. Ibid., p. 103.
72. Senate Multinational Hearings, pt. 5, p. 276.
73. The Foreign Service officer in question, Eugene H. Bird, is my father. The cable, “The Saudi Oil Income Spending Machine,” dated Aug. 26, 1972, was obtained from DOS FOIA. Actually, the Saudis would accumulate about $120 billion in dollar reserves by 1982.
74. Sampson, Seven Sisters, pp. 291–92.
75. Henry Kissinger, Years of Upheaval (Boston: Little, Brown, 1982), pp. 461–62; Sampson, Seven Sisters, pp. 292–93.
76. Harriman-Kissinger memorandum of conversation, Sept. 7, 1973, referring to a conversation of the previous day, AH. Later that autumn, after the October War, McCloy went to see Kissinger and, among other things, suggested there ought to be a “common policy” between Washington and Europe on a solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. In notes he jotted down in preparation for the meeting, he asked, “What does Europe want to see accomplished there? Would it prefer to see Israel liquidated in return for the continued flow of oil? If not, what?” (“Notes for Meeting with Secretary Kissinger on November 28, 1973,” box NA 1, folder 1, JJM.)