Sources
In keeping with the statutory requirement of the Foreign Relations series, the editors have complete access to all the retired records and papers of the Department of State: the decimal central files; the special decentralized files (“lot files”) at the bureau, office, and division levels; and the files of the Executive Secretariat. Virtually all the Department’s files have been permanently transferred to the National Archives and Records Administration at College Park, Maryland (Archives II). All of these files, which the exception of the INR/IL historical files, and the administrative lot file that was later destroyed, are open for research at the National Archives.
The editors of the Foreign Relations series also have full access to the papers of Presidents Truman and Eisenhower, and other White House foreign policy records. Presidential papers maintained and preserved at the Truman and Eisenhower libraries include significant intelligence documentation from the Department of State and other federal agencies including the National Security Council, the Central Intelligence Agency, the Department of Defense, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The editors also have full access to the files of the Central Intelligence Agency still in the possession of the Agency as well as to records transferred from the Agency to the National Archives. The Central Intelligence Agency files were crucial to the preparation of this volume and they will be discussed below.
Since this volume focuses on the development of intelligence, and not foreign policy and foreign relations, its sources are considerably different from most other Foreign Relations volumes. The decimal central files used for this volume are mainly intelligence-related, as reflected in the annotated source list below. The volume relies heavily on the retired files of the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) at the Department of State. The most useful lot file was Lot 58 D 776, covering INR’s work from 1945–1960. INR lot files subsequently have been consolidated at the National Archives, but Lot 58 D 776 provides core documentation for that consolidated file. The files of the Policy Planning Staff (S/P) of the Department of State also proved very valuable, especially S/P Files, Lot 64 D 563 and S/P–NSC Files, Lot 62 D 1, both of which had key material on psychological warfare and the Psychological Strategy Board. The lot files of the Executive Secretariat (S/S) of the Department of State were also very useful, particularly S/S–NSC, Lot 62 D 333, which contains the minutes and related papers of the Psychological Strategy Board, 1951–1953. Also of value are [Page XII] S/S–NSC Files, Lot 63 D 351, the basic master files of the Department’s NSC records for 1947–1961 and S/S–NSC Files, Lot 66 D and S/S–NSC Files, Lot 66 D 95, which both contain miscellaneous NSC records, with the latter containing NSC records of actions and some National Security Council Intelligence Directives (NSCIDs). Finally, the INR/IL Historical Files have documentation on the preparation and working of NSC 10 series, the papers establishing and refining responsibilities for covert operations. All lots mentioned above, with the exception of the INR/IL Historical Files, are available at the National Archives.
The best Central Intelligence Agency files listed are those of the Executive Registry, the Directorate of Operations, and the History Staff. They are of equal importance to the Department of State lot files. The History Staff files require special explanation. The History Staff collection, maintained by the History Staff in the Center for the Study of Intelligence, contains documents selected over time by personnel of the various components of the Agency as having significant historical value and transferred to the physical custody of the History Staff to ensure their continued availability as part of the historical record. Documents in the historical collection tend to vary widely in nature and quality and usually provide only a partial record, but they are nonetheless a major resource and have been widely used in the preparation of this volume.
The Central Intelligence Agency files from the Executive Registry, the various directorates, and the Intelligence Community Management Staff, have a more direct provenance. The Executive Registry files are the official records of the Director of Central Intelligence and are therefore crucial. The files of the Directorate of Operation were equally valuable, while the files of the Directorate of Intelligence and Directorate of Science and Technology, and the Community Management Staff were important, but not to the standard of the Executive Registry, History Staff files, or the Operations files.
The editors did not do research in the massive files of the National Security Agency or the Defense Intelligence Agency, but instead relied upon the historians at those agencies to make available key documents upon request or recommendation. At the National Archives, research in Record Group 218, the Records of the Joint Chiefs of Staff provided a few key documents. Record Group 263, the Central Intelligence Agency Files at the National Archives also fell into that same category. At the time the research for this volume was done, RG 263, contained basically sources made available to Thomas Troy for use in preparation of his book on the founding of the Agency, declassified National Intelligence Estimates and Special National Intelligence Estimates, and declassified article from the Agency in-house journal, [Page XIII] Studies in Intelligence. Since the research for this volume was undertaken, the Central Intelligence Agency has transferred more records to the National Archives and made others available on its website. Finally, Record Group 273, the records of the National Security Council contains some key NSC policy papers, official minutes of NSC meetings, and NSCIDs.
Research at the Truman and Eisenhower presidential libraries provided important documents, but certainly not to the magnitude or importance as the records of the Department of State or Central Intelligence Agency. At the Truman Library in the Papers of the President, the President’s Secretary’s File was the most important, followed closely by the Subject File with documents on organizing covert operation and copies of NSCIDs. At the Eisenhower Library the best files were the Whitman File (records kept by Eisenhower’s personal assistant Ann Whitman), the Staff Secretary Records, and the Records of the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs.
Two published works are worthy of consideration as starting points or research. The first is Michael Warner, editor, The CIA Cold War Records: The CIA under Harry Truman, which reproduces in facsimile format 81 documents covering 1945–1953, some of which are also produced in this volume. The other book is Ludwell Monatgue, General Walter Bedell Smith as Director of Central Intelligence, October 1950–February 1953, originally a classified five volume CIA study of the same name, but published in declassified form as a monograph by Pennsylvania State University Press. Montague was both a participant and an observer of the events of which he writes and supplemented his own recollections by research in CIA records and by extensive interviews of and correspondence with other key participants.
Unpublished Sources
Department of State
Central Files. See National Archives and Records Administration below.
Lot Files. For other lot files already transferred to the National Archives and Records Administration at College Park, Maryland, Record Group 59, see National Archives and Records Administration below.
A/MS Files: Lot 54 D 291
Consolidated administrative files of the Department of State for 1949–1960, as maintained by the Management Staff of the Bureau of Administration (subsequently destroyed and not transferred to the National Archives).
INR/IL Historical Files
Files of the Office of Intelligence Coordination, Bureau of Intelligence and Research.
[Page XIV]National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Maryland
Record Group 59, Records of the Department of State
Decimal Central Files, 1950–1955
100.4/PSB: Psychological Strategy Board
101.2: National Security Council
101.21: Central Intelligence Agency
103.11: U.S. federal agencies of non-Cabinet rank
103.1102: personnel of U.S. federal agencies of non-Cabinet rank
114.3: unauthorized or improper publication
120.201: workloads of diplomatic and consular representation
511.00: U.S. psychological warfare
611.00: U.S. international relations
611.61: U.S. relations with the Soviet Union
700.5411: U.S. overflights
711.5: U.S. national defense
711.52: U.S. intelligence activities
711.5200: U.S. intelligence activities
711.5261: U.S. intelligence activities in the Soviet Union
794.0221: Japanese occupied territory
Lot Files
Administration Files: Lot 62 D 220
Top Secret records of the Bureau of Administration dealing with inter-agency relations from 1948–1961
INR Files: Lot 58 D 528
Miscellaneous Top Secret files for the years 1949–1954 as retired by the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, including master files of Intelligence Estimates prepared by the Department of States Estimates Group
INR Files: Lot 58 D 776 (INR Lots 61 D 67 and 62 D 42 subsequently combined with this lot file)
Subject files for 1945–1960, as maintained by the Office of the Special Assistant to the Secretary of State for Research and Intelligence, which includes information on the birth of the intelligence organization in the Department of State and a history of the national intelligence structure
INR Files: Lot 59 D 27
Miscellaneous files for the years 1948–1954, including master file of minutes of the Intelligence Advisory Committee
INR Files, Lot 78 D 394
Files relating to National Intelligence Estimates and Special Intelligence Estimates
Policy Planning Staff Files: Lot 67 D 548
Subject files, country files, chronological files, documents, drafts and related correspondence for 1957–1961
S/P Files: Lot 64 D 563
Master file of documents, drafts, records of meetings, memoranda, and related correspondence for 1947–1953 of the Policy Planning Staff
[Page XV]S/S–NSC OCB Files: Lot 61 D 385
Master set of the administrative and country files of the Operations Coordinating Board for the years 1953–1960, as maintained by the Executive Secretariat
S/P–NSC Files: Lot 62 D 1
Serial and subject master file of National Security Council documents and correspondence for the years 1948–1961 maintained by the Policy Planning Staff
S/S–NSC Files: Lot 62 D 333
Master file of minutes and papers of the Psychological Strategy Board for the years 1951–1953, as maintained by the Executive Secretariat
S/S–NSC Files: Lot 62 D 430
Master file of the Operations Coordinating Board for the years 1953–1960, as maintained by the Executive Secretariat
S/S–NSC Files: Lot 63 D 351
Serial master file of National Security Council documents and correspondence and related Department of State memoranda for 1947–1961, as maintained by the Executive Secretariat
S/S–NSC Files: Lot 66 D 148
Miscellaneous files concerning subjects considered by the National Security Council during 1949–1962, as maintained by the Executive Secretariat
S/S–NSC (Miscellaneous) Files: Lot 66 D 95
Administrative and miscellaneous National Security Council documentation, including NSC Records of Action for 1947–1963, as maintained by the Executive Secretariat
P Files: Lot 52 D 432
Files of Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs Edward W. Barrett for 1951
P Files: Lot 55 D 339
Files of the Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs, 1951–1952
S/S–RD Files
Files of restricted data materials maintained by the Executive Secretariat
Record Group 218, Records of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Papers of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Record Group 263, Records of the Central Intelligence Agency
Background documents from various sources made available to Thomas Troy in connection with the preparation of his book on the founding of the Central Intelligence Agency
Collection of NIE’s, SNIE’s and SE’s
Declassified articles from Studies in Intelligence, a CIA publication
Record Group 273, Records of the National Security Council
Official NSC meeting minutes file
Records of the NSC Representative for Internal Security
Record set of NSC policy papers
[Page XVI]Record Group 306
USIA Files, Lot 63 A 190, Files of the U.S. Information Agency
Record Group 457, Records of the National Security Agency
Special Research History Files
Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
Radford Papers
National Security Council
Operations Coordination Board Records of Project Approvals
Central Intelligence Agency
Directorate for Intelligence files
Job 80–R01440R
Directorate for Operations files
Job 78–04513R
Job 78–05091A
Job 79–01228A
Job 80–01795R
Job 84–B00389R
Directorate for Science and Technology files
Job 83–02415A
Community Management Staff files
Job 82–00400R
Executive Registry files
Files of the Directors of Central Intelligence
Job 80–R01731R
Job 83–01034R
Job 85–500362R
Job 86–T00268R
Job 86–B00269R
Job 95–G00278R
History Staff files
Documents from various components of the Agency transferred to the custody of the History Staff, Center for the Study of Intelligence
Job 83–00036R
Job 83–00764R
Job 83–01034R
Job 84–00022R
Job 84–00161R
Job 84–T00286R
Job 84–T00389R
[Page XVII]Defense Intelligence Agency
Records made available by the Defense Intelligence Agency Historian
National Security Agency
Records held by or obtained through the Center for Cryptologic History, National Security Agency
Records of the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board
Records of the meetings, reports and miscellaneous papers of the President’s Board of Consultants for Foreign Intelligence Activities and, its successor, the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board
Truman Library, Independence, Missouri
President’s Secretary’s Files
Subject File
Official File
Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kansas
Dulles Papers
Papers of John Foster Dulles, 1952–1959
Eisenhower Papers, Whitman File
Papers of Dwight D. Eisenhower as President of the United States, 1953–1961, maintained by his personal secretary, Ann C. Whitman. The Whitman File includes: the Name Series, the Dulles-Herter Series, Eisenhower Diaries, Ann Whitman (ACW) Diaries, National Security Council Records, Miscellaneous Records, Cabinet Papers, Legislative Meetings, International Meetings, the Administration Series, and the International File
Eisenhower Records
Records of Dwight D. Eisenhower as President of the United States, including the daily appointment book of the President
Hoover Commission Report on Intelligence Activities
Project “Clean Up”
Records of Gordon Gray, Robert Cutler, Henry R. McPhee, and Andrew J. Goodpaster, 1953–1961
Staff Secretary Records
Records of the office of the Staff Secretary, 1952–1961
Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs Records
Special Assistant to the President for Science and Technology Records
Published Sources
Benson, Robert L., and Michael Warner, eds., Venona: Soviet Espionage and the American Response, 1939–1957. Washington, D.C.: Central Intelligence Agency, 1996.
[Page XVIII]Montague, Ludwell Lee. General Walter Bedell Smith as Director of Central Intelligence, October 1950–February 1953. University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1992.
Pedlow, Gregory W., and Donald E. Welzenbach. The CIA and the U–2 Program, 1954–1974. Washington, D.C.: Central Intelligence Agency.
U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Harry S. Truman, 1950, 1951, 1952–1953. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1965–1966.
U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Dwight D. Eisenhower, 1953, 1954, 1955. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1959–1960.
Warner, Michael, ed., The CIA Under Harry Truman, Washington, D.C.: Central Intelligence Agency, 1994.