Office of the Historian

55. Letter From the Deputy Under Secretary of State (Murphy) to the Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs (Sprague)1

Washington, October 31, 1957.

Dear Manny: I have noted your good letter of October 112 regarding the agreement mentioned in my letter of October 93 concerning the consideration of applications for military assistance by Latin American countries.

I think your letter is based on a misunderstanding, but I am not sure whether the misunderstanding is yours or ours. It was my understanding that there was agreement not merely with the Joint Chiefs of Staff, but with you as well because John Irwin attended the meeting at which the agreement was made. I believed there was no conflict of view. That concerns the substance of the agreement. As to channels, obviously, in communicating on this subject, we will continue to address you as the responsible Defense official when we have communications to make on this subject.

In writing you personally and informally this way I would like to add that one of the advantages we find in the periodic meetings with the JCS, which are attended by you or your representative, is that we are able to have discussions and arrive at agreements which are concurred in by you as well as the JCS. That in no sense, it seems to me, alters the use of regular channels between your office and mine, and is not so intended.

Yours sincerely,

Robert Murphy4
  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 720.5–MSP/10–1157. Secret. Drafted by Murphy.↩
  2. Supra.↩
  3. See footnote 2, supra.↩
  4. Printed from a copy which bears this typed signature.↩