Office of the Historian

310. Memorandum From Michael V. Forrestal of the National Security Council Staff to President Kennedy0

Washington, July 3, 1963.

FAR EAST ROUNDUP

[Here follow sections on South Vietnam (for text, see Foreign Relations, 1961–1963, volume III, pages 447-449) and Laos.]

Korea

The immediate problem in Korea is the shortfall in the current harvest, which amounts to approximately half a million tons of grain.1 After some bureaucratic delay we have succeeded in making approximately $8,500,000 worth (about 160,000 tons) of grain available to the Koreans. It will be nip and tuck whether the food arrives in Korea in time to avert real shortages, and we have suggested strongly to the Japanese that they make an interim contribution of rice. The Japanese have agreed to contribute 40,000 tons.

Over Agriculture’s objections, we allowed this emergency shipment to go forward under the current PL 480 agreement which provides [Page 652] that only 10 percent of the local currency proceeds be devoted to U.S. uses. I have told Agriculture and Treasury that we would support them in an overall review of South Korean’s dollar position when a new PL 480 agreement is negotiated this fall with a view to seeing whether we can increase the U.S.-use percentage.

The two American captains whose helicopter landed in North Korea near the Demarcation Line are alive but have not been released. Having exhausted diplomatic channels, we are beginning to take retaliatory action. We have asked Japan to deny North Korea any transit rights. Similar and increasingly severe measures are planned.

[Here follow sections on Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand.]

  1. Source: Kennedy Library, National Security Files, Meetings and Memoranda Series, Staff Memoranda, M.V. Forrestal, 11/62-11/63. Secret.↩
  2. The Department of State sent McGeorge Bundy a memorandum explaining the grain crisis and the measures to cope with it. (Memorandum from Brubeck to Bundy, June 19; Department of State, Central Files, AID (US) 15-9 S KOR) Ball and Hilsman and later Ball and McNamara discussed the grain shortage problem on June 28, agreeing that the situation was worthy of U.S. action to alleviate it. (Memoranda of telephone conversations, June 28; Kennedy Library, Ball Papers, Telephone Conversations, Korea)↩