Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XXIV, Africa

234. Memorandum From the President’s Special Assistant (Rostow) to President Johnson¹

Washington, June 5, 1968, 3:40 p.m.

SUBJECT

• Trip to Africa

At Tab A² is a possible itinerary for a 9-day trip to Africa in August. It is checked out with Joe Palmer’s Deputy (Joe is in Africa now and for the next month). I think we all believe that it would be a great boost to our policy and image met only in Africa but in all the developing countries.

Themes

The basic themes of our African policy are support for African development, support for regional and sub-regional groupings to solve common problems and develop shared resources, moral support for the Black African position on the racial question in the South, and discouragement of violence between and within countries. These should also be the themes reflected in your itinerary.

The schedule at Tab A is essentially a series of meetings with the various regional groupings which have developed in Africa over the past 3 years. This meets all the above themes and also helps us with a difficult problem of explanations to the 30 countries which you would not have time to visit. The only exception to this rule is the one day in Ghana in which you would have more time to visit Peace Corps projects, AID projects, etc.—while at the same time implicitly recognizing the most dramatic and hopeful change in an African country during the Johnson Administration.

Problems

We would have to find ways to deal with the following:

1. You would undoubtedly arrive in the wake of a bloody Congressional slaughter of the Aid Bill, which cannot help but have serious effects on our aid to Africa.

2. The proposed visit to Zambia—though terribly important from the standpoint of African policy—will put you face to face with the Rhodesian problem and undoubtedly involve a public reconfirmation of our anti-Rhodesian posture. This will not require new policy departures, but a Presidential statement will add new emphasis.

3. The itinerary is necessarily arbitrary if we are to hold the trip to nine days. For example, it excludes Liberia³ despite the fact that we have older and more direct historical ties there than with any other African nation. We can expect some flak no matter what itinerary is settled upon.

4. All the meetings suggested in the itinerary would have to be manufactured; none of them are now scheduled. We think they can all probably be arranged, but probably not without a leak. There is also the possibility that some leaders (e.g., the President of Mauritania, with which we have no relations) may refuse to come and make some noise in the press about it. (Upon investigation we can find no events currently scheduled for August which you might attend. The OAU will bring together most African Heads of State September 10–16, but in Algiers, where the welcome mat will almost certainly not be out. The tiny British Protectorate of Swaziland, completely surrounded by South Africa and Portuguese Mozambique, becomes independent on September 6. The Ministers of the East African Economic Community have their second meeting in Zambia September 16–28. But we have assumed these events come too late.)

Recommendation

If this general itinerary looks acceptable, I would suggest you authorize us to instruct our Ambassadors quietly to sound out the possibility of arranging the suggested meetings. Joe Palmer’s current trip would also be very useful in this regard. If we are to arrange four meetings of Heads of State within a period of 9 days, we need to start now.

Walt

Itinerary okay; go ahead and take field soundings⁴

Hold off

Call me

1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, International Meetings and Travel File, President’s Proposed Trip to Africa, August 1968. Secret.
2. Not printed.
3. A notation in the margin in Johnson’s handwriting reads: “Can’t we include?”
4. President Johnson checked this option and added the handwritten notation, “if OK by Rusk.” On July 2, Rostow forwarded an undated memorandum from Katzenbach to the President recommending final approval for a 9-day trip in August to Morocco, Niger, Nigeria, Ethiopia, East Africa, Zambia, Congo (K), Ghana, Liberia, and Senegal. A handwritten notation on Rostow’s memorandum reads: “We don’t have Secy. Rusk’s formal recommendations. He will discuss privately his recommendation—and reservation.” (Johnson Library, National Security File, International Meetings and Travel File, President’s Proposed Trip to Africa, August 1968) No record of Johnson’s conversation with Rusk has been found, but the proposed trip did not take place.