Office of the Historian

36. Telegram From the Department of State to the Embassy in the Soviet Union0

Washington, February 21, 1962, 7:49 p.m.

1940. Please deliver following message immediately to Foreign Office for Khrushchev. Advise date time delivery. Message being released here 8 p.m., EST, February 21.

Begin Text.

Dear Mr. Chairman:

I thank you warmly for your message of congratulations on Colonel Glenn’s successful space flight, and I welcome your statement that our countries should cooperate in the exploration of space.1 I have long held this same belief and indeed put it forward strongly in my first State of the Union message.

We of course believe also in strong support of the work of the United Nations in this field and we are cooperating directly with many other countries individually. But obviously special opportunities and responsibilities fall to our two countries.

I am instructing the appropriate officers of this Government to prepare new and concrete proposals for immediate projects of common action, and I hope that at a very early date our representatives may meet to discuss our ideas and yours in a spirit of practical cooperation.

Sincerely,

John F. Kennedy. End text.

Rusk
  1. Source: Kennedy Library, National Security Files, Countries Series, USSR, Khrushchev Correspondence. Official Use Only; Verbatim Text; Niact. Another copy is in Department of State, Presidential Correspondence: Lot 66 D 204. Also printed in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States:John F. Kennedy, 1962, p. 158, and Department of State Bulletin, March 12, 1962, p. 411.↩
  2. Document 35.↩