67. Memorandum of Telephone Conversation Between the Under Secretary of State (Ball) and the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy)0
Bundy—We have now written, and everybody but you have signed off on it, and I hope you won’t object, a message to the Chairman1 telling him it’s your fault and not ours on the basic ground that they misled us—the thing that we think we ought to get back into his chest—. The word of the Soviet Government is what caused the trouble. David Cline [Klein] is arranging to send it out. Do you want to hear it?
Ball—I would like to hear it. I’ll tell you about my conversation with Stevenson.2
Bundy—How did it go?
Ball—With Stevenson?
Bundy—Yes, mine is in the typewriter.
[Page 196]Ball—The situation with Stevenson is that he finally got Thant out of bed and Thant has agreed to send a message to K which he probably can’t do tonight because of the communications but will do it first thing in the morning.
Bundy—Why don’t we offer him some communications?
Ball—I think it is probably a matter of his composing it.
Bundy—Nothing is going to happen tonight.
Ball—He says that first thing in the morning he will send the message to K saying that he, pending some consideration of his proposal, he would hope that K will keep his ships away and prevent a confrontation because he thinks there is a chance the Americans are prepared to discuss the modalities of a negotiation.
Bundy—Does that pin us to anything?
Ball—I raised this with Stevenson and in the first place this is not a public thing, this is a private—
Bundy—It will be public soon enough.
Ball—He doesn’t.
Bundy—U Thant is on and we are not on on this?
Ball—That’s it.
Bundy—Stevenson may go down the drain.
Ball—He just gives his impression. I think it’s worth a play.
Bundy—It’s worth a try.
Ball—I asked Stevenson to try to get the thing from him in the morning and shoot it down to us as soon as he can. I think I would have put it up in tougher terms, but that’s the way it went.
Bundy—Yes, I think the main thing is that Adlai should know what he has sent in the morning.
Ball—I asked him to get it from Thant first thing and let us know, and he said he would and I hope Thant doesn’t give too much of an impression of our willingness, but in any event it’s just Thant giving an impression.
Bundy—Bundy reads reply to K.
Ball—There is only one very minor point, but I think it might be a major one. That is we use these offensive weapons; actually, my understanding in the conversation with Gromyko, that Gromyko was explicit that they had no weapons that could reach the US.
Bundy—He didn’t say it that way.
Ball—I got this from the Secretary.
Bundy—He didn’t say it. At least it did not appear in any transcript we had.
Ball—This may have been given by Dobrynin.
[Page 197]Bundy—It is true that Dobrynin has said things. I think this language is more precise in the case than we can document to the Chairman.
Ball—Well, of course his answer will be that they are not offensive.
Bundy—Well, he never said that actually.
Ball—Well, except that this was the implication of what was said by—
Bundy—Then change it to “such as long range nuclear missiles.”
Ball—Yes, I think we can do that. It takes it out of that dialectical argument as to what’s offensive and what isn’t.
Bundy—“Such weapons as long range nuclear missiles.”
Ball—Yes.
Bundy—That doesn’t let us off the bombers. “Such weapons as (we don’t want quite long range) nuclear missiles?”
Ball—I think that would be all right.
Bundy—“Of considerable range?” I don’t know George; I have cleared it with everybody else; I think we had better leave it as it is. The point is clear enough.
Ball—Yes. We will deliver that tonight then.
Bundy—It’ll be along. Klein is handling that.
Ball—The only thing that concerns me about the Stevenson thing is that he has probably given the impression to U Thant that we will go further than we will go. That’s what worries me.
Bundy—I don’t know how to advise you on that other than to say that we probably will not go further than we will go.
Ball—If it indicates a weakness in relation to K that will create another element of miscalculation.
Bundy—If he will hold off his ships, then the Americans are interested in the modalities?
Ball—Yes.
Bundy—Has Stevenson showed him our answer?
Ball—No. That is reserved for tomorrow morning.
Bundy—It would seem to me that you should say to Adlai that nothing in, from the point of view of us in Washington, any message to K should be inconsistent with that message.
Ball—I think I will get hold of Adlai first thing in the morning and let him go over and talk to Thant.
Bundy—If Adlai knows early in the morning that he must not sign the US to anything that would make that letter impossible without checking back with us.
Ball—I think that’s the way to leave it.
Bundy—Right.
- Source: Department of State, Ball Papers: Lot 74 D 272, Telcons—Cuba. No classification marking.↩
- See Document 68.↩
- A memorandum of Ball’s conversation with Stevenson at 12:20 a.m. is in Department of State, Ball Papers: Lot 74 D 272, Telcons—Cuba. See the Supplement.↩