Foreign Relations of the United States, 1955–1957, Foreign Economic Policy; Foreign Information Program, Volume IX

201. Memorandum of Discussion at the 303d Meeting of the National Security Council, Washington, November 8, 1956¹

Washington, November 8, 1956

Present at the 303rd Council meeting were the President of the United States, presiding; the Vice President of the United States; the Acting Secretary of State; the Secretary of Defense; and the Director, Office of Defense Mobilization. Also present were the Secretary of the Treasury; the Attorney General; the Special Assistant to the President for Disarmament; the Director, Bureau of the Budget; the Special Assistant to the President for Atomic Energy; the Federal Civil Defense Administrator;² the Director, International Cooperation Administration; the Director, U.S. Information Agency; the Deputy Secretary of Defense; Assistant Secretary of State Bowie; Assistant Secretary of Defense Gray; Mr. Robert B. Anderson; the Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff; the Director of Central Intelligence; the Assistant to the President; the Deputy Assistant to the President; Special Assistants to the President Jackson and Randall; the White House Staff Secretary; the Executive Secretary, NSC; and the Deputy Executive Secretary, NSC.

[Here follow pages 1–14 of the memorandum.

[During an oral briefing by the Director of Central Intelligence on significant world developments affecting United States security, with specific reference to developments in Hungary and world reaction thereto, discussion was as follows:]

At this point the President interrupted Secretary Hoover to say that Admiral Strauss had just sent him a note stating that moving pictures had been taken of Soviet tanks killing Hungarians in the streets of Budapest. The President asked whether such movies should not immediately be disseminated through our Embassies all over the world. Mr. Streibert answered that the USIA was already engaged in doing precisely this, and was trying to get the story out just as fast as it could.³ The President said it would be a good idea to send one of the best reels to Nehru. The Vice President advised sending one to Sukarno⁴ in Indonesia.

Secretary Hoover continued his account by alluding to still another problem, namely, how we could focus the violent anti-Soviet feeling throughout Europe on the Middle East and on the Arab states. He concluded by reminding the President that these were only a few of the problems which were facing the United States.

The President commented that obviously the main thing now was to get the UN police force into Egypt and the British and French forces out of Egypt. This action would pull the rug out from under the Soviet psychological offensive. The President reverted likewise to his suggestion that the moving pictures of Soviet atrocities in Budapest be given the fullest possible exploitation. Secretary Hoover counseled that we not forget that the Soviets have been pounding away on the point that the whole affair in Hungary was caused by the interference of the United States Government generally and of the Central Intelligence Agency in particular.⁵ Mr. Allen Dulles replied that the line to take in this matter was simply to state that this was an insult to the Hungarians.

[Here follows the remainder of the memorandum.]

S. Everett Gleason

1. Source: Eisenhower Library, Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File, NSC Records. Top Secret. Prepared by S. Everett Gleason on November 9.
2. Val Peterson.
3. An account of U.S. efforts to obtain a film of the uprising is in telegram 323, November 19, from the U.S. Legation in Budapest. (Department of State, Central Files, 511.005/11–1956)
4. President of Indonesia.
5. Numerous studies were subsequently made to determine whether USIA activities helped to foment the Hungarian uprising. Hungary and the 1956 Uprising, Personal Interviews with 1,000 Hungarian Refugees in Austria, prepared by International Research Associates, Inc., New York City, February 1957, is in Department of State, USIA/IOP Files: Lot 59 D 260, Hungarian Situation. Available in the USIA library is USIA Meets the Test: A Study of Fast Media Output during the Hungarian and Suez Crises, a report of June 1957, by Oren Stephens, USIA/IOP.