Office of the Historian

353. National Security Action Memorandum No. 1420

Washington, April 10, 1962.

TO

  • Honorable Edward McDermott
  • Director, Office of Emergency Planning
  • Honorable David E. Bell
  • Director, Bureau of the Budget
1.
I have received and read a report of your Stockpile Committee organized under NSAM 126.1 I think it is a careful and thoughtful study, and I commend you and the Committee on it. I accept its recommendations with one modification.
2.
In view of the dissents of the State2 and Interior Departments3 and the comments of the Department of Commerce,4 I am directing that the amendment to Section 14 of Defense Mobilization Order V-75 which you recommended incorporate additional language as follows:

“The Director of the OEP shall give notice to the above-mentioned departments of any proposed disposal and invite their views. If within thirty days either the Department of State or the Department of the Interior indicates an objection to the proposed plan which, after discussion, the Director does not support, he shall so notify the President and pre-sent the issue to him for decision. To the extent possible disposals should be made in accordance with long-run disposal plans which have been worked out in consultation with the interested departments and which take into account probable trends in supply and price both at home and abroad.”

3.
The OEP is requested to prepare draft legislation required to embody the recommendations of the Committee, in consultation with the interested executive departments; to examine the problems of the barter program in consultation with the Department of Agriculture and other interested agencies; to continue its studies of stockpile objectives and requirements in accordance with the recommendations of the report; and to prepare in consultation with the General Services Administration and other interested agencies long-range disposal programs for excess materials in the stockpile.
4.
I request the Bureau of the Budget to amend Defense Mobilization Order V-7 in accordance with the recommendations of the report and this memorandum.
John F. Kennedy6
  1. Source: Kennedy Library, National Security Files, Meetings and Memoranda Series, NSAM 142, Stockpile Rpt. Official Use Only. Copies were sent to the Secretaries of State, Defense, Interior, Commerce, and Labor; the Director of Central Intelligence; and the Administrator of the General Services Administration.↩
  2. Document 349.↩
  3. Document 350.↩
  4. See the source note, Document 349, and footnote 2, Document 351.↩
  5. See Document 351.↩
  6. Not found.↩
  7. Printed from a copy that indicates Kennedy signed the original.↩