Office of the Historian

365. Memorandum of Conversation0

Washington, June 13, 1961.

SUBJECT

  • IRBM’s for Turkey

PARTICIPANTS

  • The Secretary
  • The Under Secretary
  • General Norstad
  • Mr. Nitze, Assistant Secretary of Defense
  • Mr. Talbot, Assistant Secretary for NEA
  • Mr. Stoessel, Political Advisor to General Norstad
  • Robert N. Magill, Deputy Director, European Regional Affairs

The Secretary and General Norstad reviewed their respective conversations with Turkish Foreign Minister Sarper on the question of the IRBM program in Turkey. The Secretary said he thought the way the Vienna talks1 had gone created a somewhat different situation and that we should re-examine our approach on this question.2 Mr. Nitze thought that the Vienna talks reinforced the undesirability of asking Sarper again to consider cancellation of the IRBM program. General Norstad agreed and said that it had been the same need for demonstrating increased allied nuclear power, in the context of the “missile gap,” that had prompted the IRBM program for Europe, including those for Turkey, in the first instance.

The Secretary asked whether General Norstad had any doubts regarding the ability of the U.S. to control the use of the IRBM’s in Turkey. General Norstad said he had none whatever. He affirmed that it would be impossible for the Turks to take over the entire system during the life expectancy of these weapons and said that it should also be possible to develop a more effective two-key system. The Secretary thought that the main factor in this regard was not the two-key arrangement but whether or not the Turks could obtain the necessary know-how for operation of the entire weapon system. He said the Turks were greatly concerned [Page 703] about their possible isolation in the face of Soviet aggression and thought they might therefore be tempted in an emergency to take over the U.S. key by force. General Norstad said that the IRBM program could be handled in such a manner as to ensure that the Turks would not obtain operational knowledge of the entire system during its effective life. He agreed with the Secretary’s observation about the Turkish fear of isolation and said that both the Greeks and Turks have this concern. They regard the NATO strategic concept of “local hostile action, infiltration or incursion” as a rationalization which the major NATO powers might use to avoid a nuclear response to Soviet action against the NATO flanks. General Norstad said that he did not know quite why the Greeks and Turks felt this way but that he had been careful to reassure them and thought he had been successful.

The Secretary concluded that there was a consensus that the IRBM program should not be held up or cancelled and asked Mr. Talbot to inform the White House of the recommendation of the group.3

Note: After the meeting had broken up, General Norstad said he thought it would be unwise to volunteer anything more to the Turks on the matter. The fact that we would be proceeding with the program would be evidence enough that we had abandoned the idea of suspending or cancelling the program.

  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 782.56311/6–1361. Top Secret. Drafted by Magill and approved in S on June 26.↩
  2. Reference is to the Vienna summit meeting between President Kennedy and Premier Khrushchev June 3–&4.↩
  3. In a June 9 memorandum for Secretary Rusk, Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Foy Kohler noted that as a result of the positions taken by the Soviet Union at the Vienna summit meeting, “any move to phase out the IRBM project would have very unfortunate repercussions in Turkey and in other NATO countries as well.” He recommended suspending the phasing out of the missiles in Turkey. (Department of State, Central Files, 782.5411/6–961)↩
  4. In a June 22 memorandum from McGhee to Bundy, the Department of State reported that the deployment of IRBMs to Turkey should continue, noting that Norstad concurred with this judgment. (Ibid., S/S–NSC Files: Lot 72 D 316, NSAM 35)↩