Preface

The Foreign Relations of the United States series presents the official documentary historical record of major foreign policy decisions and significant diplomatic activity of the United States Government. The series documents the facts and events that contributed to the formulation of policies and includes evidence of supporting and alternative views to the policy positions ultimately adopted.

The Historian of the Department of State is charged with the responsibility for the preparation of the Foreign Relations series. The staff of the Office of the Historian, Bureau of Public Affairs, plans, researches, compiles, and edits the volumes in the series. This documentary editing proceeds in full accord with the generally accepted standards of historical scholarship. Official regulations codifying specific standards for the selection and editing of documents for the series were first promulgated by Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg on March 26, 1925. These regulations, with minor modifications, guided the series through 1991.

A new statutory charter for the preparation of the series was established by Public Law 102-138, the Foreign Relations Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 1992 and 1993, which was signed by President George Bush on October 28, 1991. Section 198 of P.L. 102-138 added a new Title IV to the Department of State’s Basic Authorities Act of 1956 (22 USC 4351, et seq.).

The statute requires that the Foreign Relations series be a thorough, accurate, and reliable record of major United States foreign policy decisions and significant United States diplomatic activity. The volumes of the series should include all records needed to provide comprehensive documentation of major foreign policy decisions and actions of the United States Government. The statute also confirms the editing principles established by Secretary Kellogg: the Foreign Relations series is guided by the principles of historical objectivity and accuracy; records should not be altered or deletions made without indicating in the published text that a deletion has been made; the published record should omit no facts that were of major importance in reaching a decision; and nothing should be omitted for the purposes of concealing a defect in policy. The statute also requires that the Foreign Relations series be published not more than 30 years after the events recorded. The editors are convinced that this volume, which was compiled in 1993, meets all regulatory, statutory, and scholarly standards of selection and editing.

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Structure and Scope of the Foreign Relations Series

This volume is part of a subseries of volumes of the Foreign Relations series that documents the most important issues in the foreign policy of the 5 years (1964-1968) of the administration of Lyndon B. Johnson. The subseries presents in 34 volumes a documentary record of major foreign policy decisions and actions of President Johnson’s administration. This volume presents the documentary record of major arms control policies.

Principles of Document Selection for the Foreign Relations Series

In preparing each volume of the Foreign Relations series, the editors are guided by some general principles for the selection of documents. Each editor, in consultation with the General Editor and other senior editors, determines the particular issues and topics to be documented either in detail, in brief, or in summary.

The following general selection criteria are used in preparing volumes in the Foreign Relations series. Individual compiler-editors vary these criteria in accordance with the particular issues and the available documentation. The editors also tend to apply these selection criteria in accordance with their own interpretation of the generally accepted standards of scholarship. In selecting documentation for publication, the editors gave priority to unpublished classified records, rather than previously published records (which are accounted for in appropriate bibliographical notes).

Selection Criteria (in general order of priority):

1.

Major foreign affairs commitments made on behalf of the United States to other governments, including those that define or identify the principal foreign affairs interests of the United States;

2.

Major foreign affairs issues, commitments, negotiations, and activities, whether or not major decisions were made, and including dissenting or alternative opinions to the process ultimately adopted;

3.

The decisions, discussions, actions, and considerations of the President, as the official constitutionally responsible for the direction of foreign policy;

4.

The discussions and actions of the National Security Council, the Cabinet, and special Presidential policy groups, including the policy options brought before these bodies or their individual members;

5.

The policy options adopted by or considered by the Secretary of State and the most important actions taken to implement Presidential decisions or policies;

6.

Diplomatic negotiations and conferences, official correspondence, and other exchanges between U.S. representatives and those of other governments that demonstrate the main lines of policy implementation on major issues;

7.

Important elements of information that attended Presidential decisions and policy recommendations of the Secretary of State;

8.

Major foreign affairs decisions, negotiations, and commitments undertaken on behalf of the United States by government officials and representatives in other agencies in the foreign affairs community or other branches of government made without the involvement (or even knowledge) of the White House or the Department of State;

9.

The main policy lines of intelligence activities if they constituted major aspects of U.S. foreign policy toward a nation or region or if they provided key information in the formulation of major U.S. policies, including relevant National Intelligence Estimates and Special National Intelligence Estimates as may be declassified;

10.

The role of the Congress in the preparation and execution of particular foreign policies or foreign affairs actions;

11.

Economic aspects of foreign policy;

12.

The main policy lines of U.S. military and economic assistance as well as other types of assistance;

13.

The political-military recommendations, decisions, and activities of the military establishment and major regional military commands as they bear upon the formulation or execution of major U.S. foreign policies;

14.

Diplomatic appointments that reflect major policies or affect policy changes.

Focus of Research and Principles of Selection for Foreign Relations, 1964–1968, Volume XI

The editors have reviewed the already published official record, particularly the annual publication of the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, Documents on Disarmament, and have examined documentation available in government repositories. They decided to focus the record published in this volume on the following subjects: 1) levels of production of fissionable materials for nuclear weapons production; 2) negotiation of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty; 3) negotiation of the Outer Space Treaty; 4) seabed arms control policies and discussions; 5) nuclear testing policy and its relationship to a possible comprehensive test ban agreement; and 6) the origins of the talks with the Soviet Union on strategic offensive missile and defensive anti-missile systems.

The volume presents a comprehensive collection of the records of the Committee of Principals, a high-level interagency group that formulated policies on arms control issues for the President’s approval. It also presents the authoritative record of the correspondence between President Johnson and Nikita Khrushchev and Alexei Kosygin, the President’s Soviet counterparts, on disarmament matters.

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The volume includes intelligence information, such as the ability to verify possible arms control agreements, which is contained in National Intelligence Estimates and memoranda prepared in the Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research. The editors did not, however, attempt to document the more technical and scientific dimensions of verification or to explore fully the scope and impact of intelligence gathering on arms control policies. Nor did they seek to document the intelligence available to top policymakers regarding the activities and intentions of the Soviet Union in the arms control area.

Editorial Methodology

The documents are presented chronologically according to Washington time or, in the case of conferences, in the order of individual meetings. Memoranda of conversation are placed according to the time and date of the conversation, rather than the date the memorandum was drafted.

Editorial treatment of the documents published in the Foreign Relations series follows Office style guidelines, supplemented by guidance from the General Editor and the chief technical editor. The source text is reproduced as exactly as possible, including marginalia or other notations, which are described in the footnotes. Texts are transcribed and printed according to accepted conventions for the publication of historical documents in the limitations of modern typography. A heading has been supplied by the editors for each document included in the volume. Spelling, capitalization, and punctuation are retained as found in the source text, except that obvious typographical errors are silently corrected. Other mistakes and omissions in the source text are corrected by bracketed insertions: a correction is set in italic type; an addition in roman type. Words or phrases underlined in the source text are printed in italics. Abbreviations and contractions are preserved as found in the source text, and a list of abbreviations is included in the front matter of each volume.

Bracketed insertions are also used to indicate omitted text that deals with an unrelated subject (in roman type) or that remains classified after declassification review (in italic type). The amount of material not declassified has been noted by indicating the number of lines or pages of source text that were omitted. Entire documents withheld for declassification purposes have been accounted for and are listed by headings, source notes, and number of pages not declassified in their chronological place. The amount of material omitted from this volume because it was unrelated to the subject of the volume, however, has not been delineated. All brackets that appear in the source text are so identified by footnotes.

The first footnote to each document indicates the document’s source, original classification, distribution, and drafting information. This note also provides the background of important documents and [Page VII] policies and indicates whether the President or his major policy advisers read the document. Every effort has been made to determine if a document has been previously published, and, if so, this information has been included in the source footnote.

Editorial notes and additional annotation summarize pertinent material not printed in the volume, indicate the location of additional documentary sources, provide references to important related documents printed in other volumes, describe key events, and provide summaries of and citations to public statements that supplement and elucidate the printed documents. Information derived from memoirs and other first-hand accounts has been used when appropriate to supplement or explicate the official record.

Advisory Committee on Historical Diplomatic Documentation

The Advisory Committee on Historical Diplomatic Documentation, established under the Foreign Relations statute, reviews records, advises, and makes recommendations concerning the Foreign Relations series. The Advisory Committee monitors the overall compilation and editorial process of the series and advises on all aspects of the preparation and declassification of the series. Although the Advisory Committee does not attempt to review the contents of individual volumes in the series, it does monitor the overall process and makes recommendations on particular problems that come to its attention.

Members of the Advisory Committee reviewed the documentation selected for this volume.

Declassification Review

The final declassification review of this volume, which was completed in 1996, resulted in the decision to withhold less than one-half of one percent of the documentation selected. One document was denied in full. The remaining documentation provides an account of arms control policies of the U.S. Government during this period.

The Division of Historical Documents Review of the Office of Freedom of Information, Privacy, and Classification Review, Bureau of Administration, Department of State, conducted the declassification review of the documents published in this volume. The review was conducted in accordance with the standards set forth in Executive Order 12356 on National Security Information and applicable laws, which was superseded by Executive Order 12958 on April 20, 1995.

Under Executive Order 12356, information that concerns one or more of the following categories, and the disclosure of which reasonably [Page VIII] could be expected to cause damage to the national security, requires classification:

1)

military plans, weapons, or operations;

2)

the vulnerabilities or capabilities of systems, installations, projects, or plans relating to the national security;

3)

foreign government information;

4)

intelligence activities (including special activities), or intelligence sources or methods;

5)

Foreign Relations or foreign activities of the United States;

6)

scientific, technological, or economic matters relating to national security;

7)

U.S. Government programs for safeguarding nuclear materials or facilities;

8)

cryptology; or

9)

a confidential source.

The principle guiding declassification review is to release all information, subject only to the current requirements of national security as embodied in law and regulation. Declassification decisions entailed concurrence of the appropriate geographic and functional bureaus in the Department of State, other concerned agencies of the U.S. Government, and the appropriate foreign governments regarding specific documents of those governments.

Acknowledgements

The editors wish to acknowledge the assistance of officials at the Lyndon B. Johnson Library of the National Archives and Records Administration, in particular íDavid C. Humphrey and Regina Greenwell, and other officials of specialized repositories who assisted in the collection of documents for this volume.

David S. Patterson, Evans Gerakas, and Carolyn B. Yee collected, selected, and edited the volume, under the general supervision of former General Editor Glenn W. LaFantasie. Deb Godfrey and Rita M. Baker did the copy and technical editing and Barbara-Ann Bacon of the Publishing Services Division oversaw the production of the volume. Breffni Whelan prepared the index.