335. Memorandum From the President’s Deputy Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bator) to President Johnson1
SUBJECT
- Management of Last Minute Strategy in the Kennedy Round
As you know, we will be facing the crunch in the trade negotiations during the next 2–3 weeks. Bill Roth himself will be in Geneva leading the negotiations. The problem is to provide appropriate backstopping in [Page 889] Washington, and to assure that you have an open shot at the really critical decisions.
The existing Cabinet Committee for the Kennedy Round is large and unwieldy, and leaks like a sieve. (It involves a large group of staff aides.) To protect your options, I would suggest the following alternative (which has the approval of Secretary Rusk and Bill Roth—I thought it unwise to check with anyone else, pending your approval):
—a very small command group, operating from the building on the strictest need-to-know basis, consisting of Gene Rostow (Tony Solomon), John Schnittker, Sandy Trowbridge and myself. We would maintain open communications with Roth and take responsibility for spelling out the critical choices for your decision. Gene and Schnittker, in turn, would be responsible for keeping Rusk and Freeman informed.
I apologize for making this sound like a battle plan. However, not only five years of work, but your entire trade policy is at stake. Only this kind of handpicked top-level group, under direct Presidential discipline, can both keep on top of a fast moving situation involving enormous amounts of technical detail, and make certain that your options will be protected.
During the next three weeks, I will probably have to ask for your time—perhaps twice. I will do my best to economize on meetings with you, but I am afraid that no one but the President will be able to make the final crucial decisions.
On balance, my own judgment at the moment is that we have a 2-to-1 chance of making a good bargain—one which will be good economics, good international politics, and, overall, even good domestic politics. But we will need cool nerves and fine negotiating judgment to pull it off.