Deep Politics Timeline

[Tracy Riddle]

• 2/1961 Executive Action-ZR/RIFLE : William Harvey, chief of FI/D, was briefed by authority of Richard Bissell on phase one of the mob plots. That briefing was in connection with "Executive Action Capability;" i.e., a general standby capability to carry out assassinations when required. Harvey arranges to be briefed by Edwards.
  
• 2/1961 A 106-month long economic expansion began, which lasted until 12/1969. Growth in first year was 6.1%, in second year was 3.1%. Around this time, the Soviet economy was growing 6-10% a year.
  
• 2/1961 In 1958, Senator John Kennedy delivered a major speech attacking the Eisenhower administration for allowing a "missile gap" to open up between allegedly superior Soviet forces and those of the United States. Kennedy repeated the charge of a missile gap in his successful 1960 presidential campaign, developing it into an argument for increased military spending. When he became president, his science adviser, Jerome Wiesner, informed him in February 1961 that "the missile gap was a fiction " -to which Kennedy replied with a single expletive, " delivered, " Wiesner said, "more in anger than in relief. " (Gregg Herken interview of Jerome Wiesner, February 9, 1982. Cited by Christopher A. Preble, "Who Ever Believed in the 'Missile Gap ' ? John F. Kennedy and the Politics of National Security, " Presidential Studies Quarterly 33 , no. 4 (December 2003 , p.816) The United States in fact held an overwhelming strategic advantage over the Soviets' missile force. Whether or not Kennedy already suspected the truth, he had taken a Cold War myth, had campaigned on it, and now partly on its basis, was engaged in a dangerous military buildup as president. Marcus Raskin, an early Kennedy administration analyst who left his access to power to become its critic, summarized the ominous direction in which the new president was headed: " The United States intended under Kennedy to develop a war-fighting capability on all levels of violence from thermonuclear war to counterinsurgency. " (Gareth Porter, Perils of Dominance ( Berkeley: University of California Press, 2005), p. 14. Marcus G. Raskin, Essays of a Citizen (Armonk, N.Y. : M. E. Sharpe, 1991), p. 52.
  
• 2/1/1961 First Boeing Minuteman ICBM is tested in Florida.
  
• 2/1/1961 Oswald in Minsk writes in his diary: "I mail my first request to American Embassy, Moscow for reconsidering my position. I stated, I would like to go back to U.S."
  
• 2/1/191 State Dept instruction to US embassy in Moscow, signed "Rusk": "Mrs. Marguerite Oswald called at the Department on January 26, 1961. She has not heard from her son, Lee Harvey Oswald, since December 1959, at which time he was residing at the Metropole Hotel." (H 18 130) Less than a week after Mrs. Oswald's Washington visit, the State Department sends a "Welfare-Whereabouts" memo to Moscow.
  
• 2/1/1961 JFK meets today with his National Security Council (NSC) to formulate National Security Action Memorandum 2 (NSAM2). The document calls for "an expanded guerrilla program," the addition of 3,000 men to the Army's 1,000-man Special Forces (the Green Berets), funded by a budget increase of $19 million, and a reallocation of $100 million within the Defense Department for "unconventional wars."
  
• 2/2/1961 JFK told Congress that he wanted to spur the economy by increasing unemployment benefits, increase social security payments, and raise and extend the minimum wage. GOP congressional leaders quickly attacked his ideas, but the business community saw Kennedy's program as a modest package.
  
• 2/2/1961 Walt Rostow gives JFK a memorandum about Vietnam written by Brigadier General Edward Lansdale. After reading it, JFK says: "This is the worst yet." He then adds, "You know, Ike never briefed me about Vietnam."
  
• 2/3/1961 NSAM 2 "TO: The Secretary of Defense. SUBJECT: Development of Counterguerilla Forces. At the National Security Council meeting on February 1, 1961, the President requested that the Secretary of Defense, in consultation with other interested agencies, should examine means for placing more emphasis on the development of counterguerilla forces. Accordingly, it is requested that the Department of Defense take action on this request and inform this office promptly of the measures which it proposes to take. McGeorge Bundy."
  
• 2/3/1961 Kennedy met alone with the U.S. ambassador to Laos, Winthrop Brown. The diplomat had a hard time believing his new president's desire to hear only the truth about Laos. As Brown was explaining the official policy, Kennedy stopped him. He said, "That's not what I asked you. I said, 'What do you think,' you, the Ambassador ? " (Winthrop Brown, oral history interview in 1968 by Larry J . Hackman, 14-15, JFK Library. Cited by Edmund F. Wehrle, '' 'A Good, Bad Deal': John F. Kennedy, W. Averell Harriman, and the Neutralization of Laos, 1961-1962, " Pacific Historical Review (August 1998) , p.355) Brown opened up. With the president concentrating intently on his words, Brown critiqued the CIA's and the Pentagon's endorsement of the anti-communist ruler General Phoumi Nosavan. The autocratic general had risen to power through the CIA's formation, under the Eisenhower administration, of a Laotian " patriotic organization," the Committee for the Defense of the National Interest ( CDNI ) . (Roger Hilsman, To Move a Nation: The Politics o f Foreign Policy i n the Administration of John F. Kennedy (New York: Delta, 1964), p. 115.) Brown told Kennedy frankly that Laos could be united only under the neutralist Souvanna Phouma, whose government had been deposed by CIA-Pentagon forces under Eisenhower. JFK questioned Brown extensively about the possibility of a neutral government under Souvanna that Britain, France, and the Soviet Union could all support, if the United States were to change policy. Years later, Brown recalled his hour-long conversation with the president on a neutralist Laos as "a very, very moving experience."
  
• 2/4/1961 Washington Post reported that JFK appointee to head the Export-Import Bank Charlie Merriweather had allegedly been involved in land-transaction fraud at the expense of the taxpayer; the article faulted the FBI for not catching this during its background check.
  
• 2/4/1961 JFK bans all trade with Cuba, depriving the Castro government of $35 million in annual income.
  
• 2/4/1961 Drew Pearson, in his regular radio broadcast, reports the first major battle between Robert Kennedy and J. Edgar Hoover: "The new Attorney General wants to go all out against the underworld. To do so, Bobby Kennedy proposes a crack squad of racket busters, but Edgar Hoover objects. Hoover claims that a special crime bureau reflects on the FBI, and he is opposing his new boss."
  
• 2/5/1961 Soviets launch Sputnik 5.
  
• 2/5/1961 Oswald wrote to Richard Synder at the US Embassy saying that he wanted to return to the US: "I hope that in recalling the responsibility I have to America that you remember yours in doing everything to help me since I am an American citizen." (CE 931)
  
• 2/6/1961 NY Times reported, "Kennedy Defense Study Finds No Evidence of a 'Missile Gap'." The source for this was a background interview McNamara gave the night before; he had told the reporters that if there was a gap, it was in favor of the US. JFK sent out Salinger to deny the stories about the missile gap: "These stories are incorrect. Absolutely wrong. No studies have been completed and no such finding has been made..."
  
• 2/6/1961 NSAM 10 "Memo for Mr. Bundy [from JFK.] Has the policy for Cuba been coordinated between Defense, CIA, Bissell, Mann and Berle? Have we determined what we are going to do about Cuba? What approaches are we going to make to the Latin American governments on this matter? If there is a difference of opinion between the agencies I think [it] should be brought to my attention."
  
• 2/6/1961 NSAM 12 "Memorandum for General Lemnitzer [from JFK.] Is it possible for us to distribute the available forces we now have in Vietnam more effectively in order to increase the effectiveness of anti-guerilla activities? Are there troops stationed along the border who could be made available for this activity? It is my recollection that the Vietnam army now numbers 150,000 and that we are planning to add 20,000 more, making a total of 170,000. Reports are that the guerillas number from 7,000 to 15,000. I would think that the redistribution of available forces immediately would make them more effective in this work and we would not have to wait for action during the training period of the new troops. Would you give me your judgment on this when we meet."
  
• 2/7/1961 29 major electrical firms, including GE and Westinghouse and 44 of their executives, were convicted of rigging bids and fixing prices in the sale of heavy electrical equipment.
  
• 2/8/1961 JFK said in a press conference that "it would be premature to reach a judgment as to whether there is a gap or not a gap." Then he wrote a memo to Bundy: "Could you let me know what progress has been made on the history of the missile gap controversy...I would like to know its genesis...how we came to the judgment that there was a missile gap." (Profile of Power 59)
  
• 2/8/1961 Soviets released two US Air Force officers who had crashed in Soviet territory when their RB-47 bomber went down 7/1960.
  
• 2/9/1961 Photographic data from the Vanguard 1 and 2 reveal that the earth is a slightly irregular ellipsoid.
  
• 2/10/1961 JFK met with some top liberal leaders; economist Robert Nathan argued for deficit spending to spur the economy, perhaps as much as a 60% increase in the federal budget. Kennedy felt that "Honkers" like Nathan were not living in the real world. (Profile in Power 63)
  
• 2/11/1961 JFK had a top strategy meeting with Harriman, Bohlen, Kennan and Llewellyn Thompson. All of them urged the president to ratchet down tensions between the US and Soviets. (The Wise Men 600)
  
• 2/13/1961 The U.S. embassy in Moscow receives a letter from Oswald dated February 5, stating: "I desire to return to the United States, that is if we could come to some agreement concerning the dropping of any legal proceedings against me." US embassy received a letter from Oswald asking for return of his passport. He claimed to have sent them a letter 12/1960 which he never received a reply to. "I desire to return to the United States, that is if we could come to some agreement concerning the dropping of any legal proceedings against me…I hope that in recalling the responsibility I have to America that you remember your's in doing everything you can to help me since I am an American citizen…"
  
• 2/13/1961 On this day, CIA Support Chief James O'Connell delivers poison pills to Mob liaison John Roselli who later claims to have given them to a Cuban official close to Castro. The pills are reportedly later returned after the official loses his position. In the spring of 1961, without the knowledge of the new president John Kennedy, the CIA's Technical Services Division prepared a batch of poison pills for Castro. The pills were sent to Cuba through John Rosselli. The murder plot failed because the CIA's Cuban assets were unable to get close enough to Castro to poison him. The CIA's purpose was to kill Castro just before the Bay of Pigs invasion. (Alleged Assassination Plots Involving Foreign Leaders: An Interim Report; November 20, 1975 (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1975) As Bay of Pigs planner Richard Bissell said later, "Assassination was intended to reinforce the [invasion] plan. There was the thought that Castro would be dead before the landing. Very few, however, knew of this aspect of the plan. "(Richard M. Bissell, interview by Lucien S. Vandenbroucke, Farmington, Connecticut, May 18, 1984; cited in Vandenbroucke " 'Confessions' of Allen Dulles," p. 374.)
  
• 2/13/1961 CIA 's Technical Services Division records indicate that a box of Castro 's favorite cigars treated with lethal poison were delivered to an unidentified asset. The records do not disclose whether an attempt was made to pass the cigars to Castro. (Fonzi chronology p 415)
  
• 2/13/1961 JFK received a phone call with the delayed news of Lumumba's murder. Photographer Jacques Lowe took a remarkable picture of the president at that moment. Lowe's photo of Kennedy responding to the news of Lumumba's assassination is on the desk jacket cover of Richard D. Mahoney's book JFK: Ordeal in Africa. It shows JFK horror-stricken. His eyes are shut. The fingers of his right hand are pressing into his forehead. His head is collapsing against the phone held to his ear.
  
• 2/13/1961 FBI agent Regis Kennedy reports to Hoover on Carlos Marcello: "Continued investigation...since Dec. 1957 has failed to develop vulnerable area wherein Marcello may be in violation of statutes within the FBI's jurisdiction." (HSCA vol.9 70) Around this time, RFK informs White House aides that they are to go through him before arranging any meetings with FBI officials. (The Boss 326)
  
• 2/13/1961 Soviets fire rocket toward Venus from Sputnik 5.
  
• 2/14/1961 Washington Post reported that JFK has allowed Adm. Rickover to retain his post past retirement age.
  
• 2/14/1961 JFK's decision to appoint Edward Lansdale as Ambassador to Vietnam is scuttled. Frederick E. Nolting is chosen instead.
  
• 2/14/1961 Look magazine ran an article called "How To Steal an Election," which angered Kennedy.
  
• 2/15/1961 Memorandum for Mr. Landis [from JFK]. Senators Kefauver and Gore inform me that there have been five increases in rates in the Tennessee Gas transmission without any action by the Federal Power Commission. Are they getting away with murder? If so, what can we do about it?
  
• 2/17/1961 LBJ ordered his private plane to be flown in foggy weather to his Pedernales River Ranch; the plane crashed and its pilot and copilot were killed. News of the crash does not reach the media for over a week.
  
• 2/18/1961 Discoverer 21 was launched into orbit.
  
• 2/20/1961 Agriculture Sec. Freeman responds negatively to LBJ's letter about Estes: "there have been some abuses of the law in this regard." (A Texan Looks at Lyndon)
  
• 2/20/1961 Johnson's crashed plane is reported overdue and discovered. (It has not been reported overdue for three days.) As an end result, Johnson earns $700,000 in insurance money on the lives of the two pilots and on the plane itself.
  
• 2/22/1961 In a letter to Khruschev, JFK invited him to a summit later in the year; the letter was not declassified until 10/1984. It was rather conciliatory, and Kennedy suggested that they "make more use of diplomatic channels for quiet informal discussion..."
  
• 2/22-23/1961 birth control was endorsed by the National Council of Churches at a meeting in Syracuse, NY.
  
• 2/23/1961 NSC meeting reveals Kennedy unhappy with progress in developing counterinsurgency plans.
  
• 2/23/1961 The first off-the-record conference between JFK, RFK and J. Edgar Hoover takes place today at the White House. At a White House ceremony for presentation of the Young American Medal for Bravery, Hoover bitterly confronts JFK about RFK's attempts to control the FBI.
  
• 2/23/1961 The most costly airline strike in history which shut down Trans World, Eastern, Flying Tiger, American and National airlines ended.
  
• 2/24/1961 SECRET memorandum for the file. Essential points arising from JCS meeting with the President on Thursday, February 23, 1961. 1.The President wishes to have the maximum number of men trained for counter-guerilla operations put into the areas of immediate concern. 2.He wishes to have the matter of operations in Vietminh territory pressed. 3.The JCS ought to review policy guidance on Latin America and orient it towards a deterrence of guerilla operations and counter-guerilla operations. 4.The Departments of State and Defense ought to consider new instructions to the relevant ambassadors on the urgency of counter-guerilla operations. 5.The JCS should insure that the MAAGS are orienting their work in the relevant areas toward counter-guerilla operations, using maximum influence on the local military. 6.State and Defense should look into the character of forces in Iran and decide whether they are appropriate to the military dangers which exist there. 7. The SEATO meeting should be oriented around this problem; the matter should be discussed with Mr. Rusk. 8. The JCS should read the Holifield report and be prepared to discuss the problem of nuclear weapons control. Declassified in 1987.
  
• 2/25/1961 Memphis Commercial Appeal reports that the FBI had denied rumors that Hoover would soon resign because he was not getting along with RFK.
  
• 2/25/1961 Washington Post reports that mob figure Frank Costello "has just been stripped of his American citizenship by the Supreme Court and now faces deportation to Italy..."
  
• 2/27/1961 FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover sends a letter to the State Department Office of Security about Lee Harvey Oswald, announcing a dead end in its search for an Oswald impostor in Europe. Hoover mentions Oswald's August 17, 1960 undesirable discharge from the Marines, his old Fort Worth address, and asks "that any additional information contained in the files of the Department of State regarding subject be furnished to this Bureau."
  
• 2/28/1961 Dean Rusk told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Latin America was going through a period of enormous change, and the US had a window of just a few years to influence its direction.
  
• 2/28/1961 The Second Secretary of the American Embassy in Moscow, Richard Snyder wrote Oswald saying that he should come to the Embassy to talk about returning to the US. The letter was dated 2/28, but Oswald's diary described him receiving it on this day. Albert Newman: "added proof that Oswald wrote his Historic Diary' well after the events it describes" (The Reasons Why 200)
  
• 2/28/1961 Oswald's Diary: Feb. 28th I recive letter from Embassy. Richard E. Snyder stated "I could come in for an inteview anytime I wanted."
  
• 3/1961 Early March - According to his 1964 Oral History at the JFK Library, JFK asks his friend Florida Senator George Smathers about the reaction throughout South America if Castro were to be assassinated. Smathers did not recommend the action.
  
• 3/1961 President Kennedy appointed E. Grant Stockdale, an old friend and fundraiser, as Ambassador to Ireland. This decision was criticised by some political commentators. Time Magazine pointed out: "On the campaign trail last fall, Jack Kennedy pledged that U.S. embassies would no longer be political plums for heavy campaign contributors, would be staffed solely "on the basis of ability." But last week, as reports of the Administration's favorites for diplomatic posts filtered through Washington, many of Kennedy's staunchest admirers wondered aloud where reward stopped and ability began.... Among the front runners for top ambassadorial assignments... Grant Stockdale, 45, a Miami real estate dealer and former administrative assistant to Jack Kennedy's old Senate pal, Florida Democrat George Smathers, will be Ambassador to Ireland."
  
• 3/1961 Project name ZR/RIFLE first appears in files, although the first recorded approval is dated Feb 19 '62. Its purpose is to develop killers for political assassinations. Harvey's master plan for the project includes the use of cover stories and phony 201 files. ZRRIFLE continued on a course separate from the Edwards/O'Connell/Mafia operation against Castro until Nov 15, '61 when Harvey discusses with Bissell the application of the ZR/RIFLE program to Castro. Harvey 's notes of the discussion state both Bissell and Helms place Harvey in charge of the operation against Castro.
  
• 3/1961 Notre Dame Law Review publishes an article by Hoover: "The FBI is a fact-gathering agency. It does not…make recommendations or evaluations."
  
• 3/1961 Kennedy rejected the CIA's current Trinidad Plan for "an amphibious/airborne assault" on Cuba, favoring a quiet landing at night in which there would be "no basis for American military intervention." "The Bay of Pigs Invasion: A Comprehensive Chronology of Events, " in Bay of Pigs Declassified, edited by Peter Kornbluh ( New York: New Press, 1998) , pp. 269-70.
  
• 3/1961 Around this time, the Philadelphia FBI begins obtaining verbatim conversations of local Mafia leader Angelo Bruno. "Bureau records…indicated that Marcello initiated various attempts to forestall or prevent the anticipated prompt deportation action…According to the Philadelphia underworld leader, Marcello had enlisted his close Mafia associate, Santos Trafficante of Florida, in the reported plan. Trafficante in turn contacted Frank Sinatra to have the singer use his friendship with the Kennedy family on Marcello's behalf. This effort met with failure and may even have resulted in intensified Federal efforts…" (HSCA 9 p70)
  
• 3/1961 US Agriculture Dept employee William E. Morris is in Texas and meets Billie Sol Estes for the first time. Estes foe Dr. John Dunn prepares an anonymous report for the FBI on his dealings. He soon makes it available to radio commentator Dan Smoot. (Los Angeles Times 8/16/62; NYT 6/11/62)
  
• Late March Sen. Fulbright warned JFK that the invasion plan was not a secret, and might fail. Even if it succeeded it would produce hard feelings against the US in the whole region. (The Perfect Failure 106)
  
• 3/1961 CIA Internal Information Report no. CS-3/467,630: "Many people in Camaguey [an important air base in Cuba] believe that the Castro regime is tottering and that the situation can at any moment degenerate into bloody anarchy." (The Bay of Pigs, Wyden)
  
• 3/1961 US Air Force Intelligence Report: "A great percentage of…[Castro's] officers are believed ready to rebel against the government at a given moment, taking their troops with them." (The Bay of Pigs, Wyden)
  
• 3/1961 CIA Internal Information Report no. CS-3/470,587: "It is generally believed that the Cuban Army has been successfully penetrated by opposition groups and that it will not fight in the event of a showdown." (The Bay of Pigs, Wyden)
  
• 3/1/1961 JFK creates the Peace Corps by Executive Order. (Almanac of American History) This program would train volunteers to aid underdeveloped countries. Kennedy would ask Jawaharlal Nehru what he thought of the idea; Nehru replied that it was a good idea - privileged young Americans could learn a lot from Indian villagers. Congress passes enabling legislation six months from now. R. Sargent Shriver becomes the first director on March 4, 1961.
  
• 3/1/1961 Cable to US Embassy in Saigon: "White House ranks defense Viet-Nam among highest priorities US foreign policy."
  
• 3/1/1961 During this month, and at JFK's direct order, the Frente, the umbrella group of anti-Castro organizations organized by the CIA's political liaison E. Howard Hunt, is replaced by a more liberal Cuban Revolutionary Council. It now includes Manolo Ray, whom many consider a democratic socialist, (Silvia Odio's father was one of the key backers of Ray's organization, called JURE.) Hunt terms Ray's politics Fidelissimo sin Fidel (Fidelism without Fidel), is outraged at the appointment, and (either) resigns or is dismissed from his job as the CIA's political action officer for the Bay of Pigs operation.
  
• March-April -- as the time for the Cuban invasion approaches, the principal counterrevolutionary leaders are arrested in Cuba and the groups in the Escambray mountains are disbanded. The CIA not only loses their major means of communication, but also their control over the internal networks, which increase the disorganization and shatter the parallel plans. This information is not passed on to JFK, and emergency meetings are held among CIA officials in Florida and in Langley, Virginia, in search of a solution. In a final attempt, the Agency decides to send a group of agents to try and rescue the detained leaders.
  
• 3/1-16/1961 Oswald's Diary: I now live in a state of expectation about going back to the U.S. I confided with Zeger he supports my judgment but warnes me not to tell any Russians bout my desire to reture. I understade why now.
  
• 3/2/1961 Emery J. Adams of the State Security Office (SY/E) requests several offices to "advise if the FBI is receiving information about Harvey [Oswald] on a continuing basis. If not, please furnish this Office with the information which has not been provided the FBI so that it may be forwarded to them."
  
• 3/3/1961 JFK dedicates the National Wildlife Federation Building and says "our future greatness and strength depend upon the continued abundant use of our natural resources." (Kennedys: Chronological History)
  
• 3/3/1961 JFK meets with PM Keith Holyoake of New Zealand to discuss raising living standards in poor nations, as well as the situation in Laos and the importance of checking Communism in Asia. (Kennedys: Chronological History)
  
• 3/3/1961 Brig. Gen. John W. White speech to the National Security Forum, Columbus, Ohio. The State Dept substituted the phrase "defeat of Communist aggression" for the word "victory" because it sounded too militaristic.
  
• 3/3/1961 Gen. Joseph M. Swing, director of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, secretly informs Hoover and the New Orleans FBI that "the Attorney General has been emphasizing…the importance of taking prompt action to deport notorious hoodlums. In this connection, the Marcello case is of particular interest. A final order of deportation has been entered against Marcello but this fact is being held in strictest confidence." (The Plot to Kill the President, Blakey, p243)
  
• 3/5/1961 Oswald answered Synder, saying he could not leave Minsk without Soviet approval and wanted to handle the problem by mail.
  
• 3/6/1961 Gerald Patrick Hemming is approved as a CIA contact. O&CIA
  
• 3/9/1961 Washington Post reports: "The FBI has begun a thorough probe of alleged illegal fund raising inside the Post Office during the last election. The money went to Republican campaign coffers."
  
• 3/9/1961 NYT reports that a film will be made about JFK's time as skipper of PT-109.
  
• 3/9/1961 A CIA officer assigned to the Mexico City Station meets in Mexico City with Rolando Cubela to sound out Cubela on his views pertaining to the Cuban situation. Although this meeting proves inconclusive, it leads to other meetings out of which will grow Project AMLASH. Cubela will repeatedly insist that the essential first step in overthrowing the regime is the elimination of Fidel Castro himself, which Cubela claims he is prepared to accomplish.
  
• 3/9/1961 JFK peppered his National Security Council with questions that exposed contradictions in U.S. policy and pointed the way toward a neutralist Laos. His questioning uncovered the uncomfortable truth that the United States had sent in much more military equipment in the past three months to aid Phoumi Nosavan than the Soviets had in support of the Communist Pathet Lao forces. The president then pointed out that it was "a basic problem to us that all the countries who are supposedly our allies favor the same person ( Souvanna ) , as the Communists do. " JFK was about to join them. The next day, Kennedy's Soviet ambassador Llewellyn Thompson told Nikita Khrushchev in Moscow that the United States was now seeking a "neutralization of Laos accomplished by a commission of neutral neighbors. " Khrushchev was surprised at Kennedy's turnaround. He said the new American position differed agreeably from the old one.
  
• 3/10/1961 The University of Michigan Band stops for three days in Minsk during its tour of the Soviet Union and is given a reception at the Minsk Polytechnical Institute. Katherine Mallory, a flutist, happens to meet Lee Harvey Oswald in a surging crowd of wellwishers. He offers to interpret for her. He manages to volunteer that he is "an ex-Marine who despised the United States and hopes to spend the rest of his life in Minsk."
  
• 3/11/1961 White House meeting about Cuba; present were JFK, Bissell, Dulles, the JCS, Bundy, Rusk, McNamara and Schlesinger. The CIA laid out a plan for a small invasion force landing on the south coast near the city of Trinidad after opening air strikes. Kennedy thought the idea was "too spectacular. It sounds like D-Day. You have to reduce the noise level of this thing." He made it clear there would be no US forces involved and the US must be able to plausibly deny any involvement. Dulles warned that the exile invasion force could not just be turned off and sent back to the States: "we can't have them wandering around the country telling everyone what they have been doing." He also said that Castro was having pilots trained to fly MiGs in Czechoslovakia, and the invasion had to take place before those pilots were ready to fight. (Bay of Pigs, Wyden) Both CIA officials argue strongly for prompt action against Cuba. The landing spot at the South Central coastal town of Trinidad is also favored by the Joint Chiefs. Of the Bay of Pigs invasion, General S. L. A. Marshall will later write: "The Joint Chiefs were never asked to approve any plan; they were not besought to analyze that final plan that became operative. They were figuratively put in a corner and given to understand they should not interfere or pass judgment."
  
• 3/11/1961 NSAM 31 "Memorandum of Discussion on Cuba, March 11, 1961. The President directed that the following actions be taken: 1.Every effort should be made to assist patriotic Cubans in forming a new and strong political organization, and in conjunction with this effort a maximum amount of publicity buildup should be sought for the emerging political leaders of this organization, especially those who may be active participants in the military campaign of liberation. Action: Central Intelligence Agency. 2.The United States government must have ready a white paper on Cuba and should also be ready to give appropriate assistance to Cuban patriots in a similar effort. Action: Arthur Schlesinger in cooperation with the Department of State....4.The President expects to authorize US support for an appropriate number of patriotic Cubans to return to their homeland. He believes that the best possible plan from the point of view of combined military, political and psychological considerations has not yet been presented, and new proposals are to be concerted promptly. Action: Central Intelligence Agency with appropriate consultation. McGeorge Bundy."
  
• 3/13/1961 JFK proposed the Alliance for Progress, a social and economic development project for Latin America.
  
• 3/14/1961 United Services Organization Inc. gives its annual award to J. Edgar Hoover for his "unselfish contributions to the American heritage."
  
• 3/14/1961 Santos Trafficante, Sam Giancana and Johnny Roselli meet in the Fontainbleau Hotel. They have contracted a Cuban hit-man to kill Fidel Castro. Bob Maheu brings cash for paying the hit-man and poison pills to do the job with. The hit-man may have been a cook in a restaurant frequented by Castro who was willing to poison the Premier's meal. A few days later, Castro is reported to be ill. Maheu says: "Castro's ill. He's going to be sick two, three days. Wow, we got him." But, Castro recovers. As Sheffield Edwards later reports: "Castro stopped visiting the restaurant where the "asset" was employed." The CIA will eventually tell the Church Committee that it was involved in nine Castro assassination plots in all, including those with the Mafia. Castro himself will later produce a detailed list of 24 plots against his life involving the CIA. What is significant is that both the CIA and Castro agree on when the plans began.
  
• 3/15/1961 Cuba's foreign minister tells the United Nations that the United States is guilty of "illegal, perfidious and premeditated" aggressions. He accuses JFK by name of encouraging "preparations for the invasion of Cuba," an invasion, he says a few days later, that is "imminent." AQOC
  
• 3/17/1961 JFK lifted a ban on importation and distribution of communist literature into the US.
  
• 3/17/1961 Nineteen-year-old Marina Nikolaevna Pruskakova first meets Lee Harvey Oswald at a dance at the Palace of Culture for Professional Workers in Minsk. They will meet again a week later at another dance and will be together for much of the evening. Oswald's Diary: March 17 -- I and Erich went to trade union dance. Boring but at the last hour I am introduced to a girl with a French hair-do and red-dress with white slipper I dance with her. than ask to show her home I do, along with 5 other admirares. Her name is Marina. We like each other right away. she gives me her phone number and departs home with an not-so-new freiend in a taxi, I walk home.
  
• 3/18/1961 Washington Post reported that President Kennedy ordered the Post Office to stop holding up Communist propaganda received in the mail from abroad. "A review…has disclosed that the program serves no useful intelligence function…"
  
• 3/18/1961 Oswald's Diary: March 18-31-- We walk I talk a little about myself she talks alot about herself. her name is Marina N. Prosakoba.
  
• 3/18-24/1961 Hoover writes internal FBI memos expressing his concern that Hollywood producer Jerry Wald wants to make a film on RFK's book on organized crime, The Enemy Within. (Goddess, Summers, p497)
  
• 3/20/1961 A letter posted on March 5th, reaches the American Embassy in Moscow from Lee Harvey Oswald regarding his desire to return to the USA. It reiterates that he is unable to leave Minsk without official permission. Oswald asks that preliminary inquiries be put in the form of a questionnaire and sent to him.
  
• 3/21/1961 JFK meets with British PM Harold Macmillan at Key West.
  
• 3/22/1961 Cuban exile leaders held a final pre-invasion meeting, after which one told reporters: "We have the forces…to overthrow Castro, and this year we are going to become the first occupied country to expel international communism."
  
• 3/22/1961 An asset of the CIA's Miami Station reports that Rolando Cubela and Juan Orta want to defect and need help in escaping from Cuba.
  
• 3/22/1961 J. Edgar Hoover and JFK have an off-the-record lunch meeting at the White House. RFK schedules a last minute appointment with JFK just before Hoover arrives. Hoover brings with him a folder detailing Judith Campbell's telephone calls to the White House. The folder also details her relationship with Sam Giancana. When Hoover leaves, JFK says to Kenny O'Donnell: "Get rid of that bastard. He's the biggest bore."
  
• 3/23/1961 At a March 23 news conference on Laos, Kennedy made his policy change public by stating that the United States "strongly and unreservedly" supported "the goal of a neutral and independent Laos, tied to no outside power or group of powers, threatening no one, and free from any domination." He endorsed the British appeal for a cease-fire between General Phoumi's army and the neutralist-communist forces arrayed against them. He also joined the British in calling for an international conference on Laos. The Russians agreed. Kennedy's new direction enabled the Russians to come together with the British, the Americans, and eleven other countries in Geneva on May 11 in an effort to resolve the question of Laos. In the meantime, however, Kennedy was being led to the brink of war. The Communist forces continued to advance in Laos. They seemed to be on their way to total victory before the Geneva Conference even convened. The president was determined not to let them overrun the country. At the same time, as his special counsel Ted Sorensen pointed out, he was unwilling " to provide whatever military backing was necessary to enable the pro-Western forces [of General Phoumi] to prevail. This was in effect the policy he had inherited-and he had also inherited most of the military and intelligence advisers who had formed it." (Theodore C. Sorensen, Kennedy (New York: Konecky & Konecky, 1966) , p. 641) These men kept pressing him to turn back from the neutralist coalition he was pursuing, which they saw as a foolish concession to the Communists.
  
• 3/24/1961 Washington Post reports that LBJ "doesn't want Secret Service agents following him around when he is in Washington…he didn't think it was necessary…"
  
• 3/24/1961 The Embassy again wrote Oswald that he would have to come to Moscow. (CE 933,940)
  
• 3/26/1961 JFK meets with British PM Macmillan at Key West to discuss how to avert further escalation of the problems in Laos. (Almanac of American History)
  
• 3/26/1961 In a talk with Congressional leaders, JFK promised that Laos would not fall to the Communists.
  
• 3/27/1961 Dan Smoot forwarded to the FBI an anonymous 14-page memo on Billie Sol Estes' business dealings. (NYT 6/7/62)
  
• 3/27/1961 singer Paul Robeson, possibly drugged by CIA, attempts suicide after party in Moscow
  
• 3/28/1961 JFK told Congress, "Our arms must be subject to ultimate civilian control and command at all times...The primary purpose of our arms is peace, not war...to deter all wars...to insure the adequacy of our bargaining power for an end to the arms race. The basic problems facing the world today are not susceptible to a military solution. Neither our strategy nor our psychology as a nation - and certainly not our economy - must become dependent upon the permanent maintenance of a large military establishment...Our arms will never be used to strike the first blow in any attack." JFK told Congress that he had ordered McNamara to "reappraise our entire defense strategy, capacity, commitments and needs in the light of present and future dangers." Initially, the basic policies outlined by President Kennedy in a message to Congress on March 28, 1961, guided McNamara in the reorientation of the defense program. Kennedy rejected the concept of first-strike attack and emphasized the need for adequate strategic arms and defense to deter nuclear attack on the United States and its allies. U.S. arms, he maintained, must constantly be under civilian command and control, and the nation's defense posture had to be "designed to reduce the danger of irrational or unpremeditated general war". The primary mission of U.S. overseas forces, in cooperation with allies, was "to prevent the steady erosion of the Free World through limited wars". Kennedy and McNamara rejected massive retaliation for a posture of flexible response. The U.S. wanted choices in an emergency other than "inglorious retreat or unlimited retaliation", as the president put it.
  
• 3/28/1961 Memorandum for the Secretary of Defense. The President would like a brief memorandum giving the breakdown of what went into Laos, year by year from 1954 on, in the form of military aid and, if it is relevant, economic aid. He mentioned the sum of $340 million....He understands that we gave them the weapons, but the training mission...was a French responsibility. C.V. Clifton. (Declassified in 1988)
  
• 3/28/1961 A national intelligence estimate prepared for Kennedy reported that Diem's position in South Vietnam had grown precarious.
  
• 3/29/1961 The 23rd Amendment is adopted. Citizens of the District of Columbia will now have the right to vote in presidential elections.
  
• 3/29/1961 In the Cabinet Room of the White House, Richard Bissell, representing the CIA, presents a progress report of Operation Zapata, the top-secret plan to invade Cuba. According to Gaeton Fonzi in THE LAST INVESTIGATION, "the Bay of Pigs plan provided . . . the historic opportunity for the CIA to begin domestic field operations on an unprecedented scale." "The Agency's officers, contract agents, informants and contacts reached into almost every area of the community." "The preparation for the Bay Of Pigs invasion gave birth to a special relationship between CIA operatives and the Cuban exiles. That relationship would intensify into a mutuality of interests which transcended even Presidential directives and official United States policy."
  
• 3/30/1961 The first announcement of 73 base closings by Defense Secretary McNamara. He claimed it would result in the saving of $220 million a year. (The Pentagon, Mollenhoff)
  
• 3/30/1961 Oswald enters the Russian Fourth Clinical Hospital for an adenoids operation. Marina visits him daily. By the time he leaves the hospital he has asked her to be his fiancee and she has agreed to consider it.
  
• 3/30/1961 In spite of the president's turn toward neutralism at his March 23 press conference, on March 30 General Lemnitzer told reporters that the neutralist leader Souvanna Phouma was not to be trusted. While Souvanna might not be a Communist, Lemnitzer said, "he couldn't be any worse if he were a communist." (Chalmers M. Roberts, First Rough Draft: A Journalist's Journal of Our Times (New York: Praeger, 1973), p. 194) Lemnitzer and the Joint Chiefs were resisting the president's new direction. They urged him instead to support Phoumi with U.S. combat troops to halt the Communist offensive before it was too late. Otherwise there would be nothing left to negotiate in Geneva, even in the direction of neutralism. As the crisis deepened in March and April, Kennedy agreed to preparations for a military buildup. However, he emphasized to everyone around him that he had not given a final go-ahead to intervene in Laos. (Sorensen, Kennedy, p. 643) Moreover, the Joint Chiefs kept revising upward the number of troops they wanted him to deploy there: asking initially for 40,000; raising the number to 60,000 by the end of March; hiking it to 140,000 by the end of Apri1. (Charles A. Stevenson, The End of Nowhere: American Policy toward Laos since 1954 (Boston: Beacon Press, 1972 ) , p.151) Kennedy began to balk at their scenarios. General Lemnitzer then cabled the president more cautiously from a trip to Laos, recommending a "more limited commitment" there. A suspicious JFK backed away from the entire idea of troops in Laos. As he told Schlesinger at the time, "If it hadn't been for Cuba, we might be about to intervene in Laos." Waving Lemnitzer's cables, he said, "I might have taken this advice seriously." (Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., A Thousand Days (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1965)
  
• 3/31/961 CIA approves sending carbines to Dominican Republic dissidents to help in plot to assassinate dictator Rafael Trujillo.
  
• 3/31/1961 The deputy chief of the Passport Office writes to the Consular Section of the State Department regarding Oswald, stating: "...this file contains information first, which indicates that mail from the mother of this boy is not being delivered to him and second, that is has been stated that there is an impostor using Oswald's identification data and that no doubt the Soviets would love to get hold of his valid passport, it is my opinion that the passport should be delivered to him only on a personal basis and after the Embassy is assured to its complete satisfaction that he is returning to the United States."
  
• 3/31/1961 US Embassy memo from John T. White to Edward J. Hickey expressed the staff's satisfaction that Oswald had not renounced his US citizenship. (CE 970, H 18 367)
  
• 3/31/1961 Kennedy cancels Cuban sugar quota for 1961.
  
• 3/31/1961 Chester Bowles, appalled to learn of what he calls "the Cuban adventure" gives Dean Rusk a lengthy memorandum outlining his vigorous objections. Rusk seems unmoved, and discourages Bowles from making his case directly to the President. JFK does not see the memo.
  
• 3/31/1961 Jackie Kennedy and three-year-old daughter, Caroline, are spending the Easter holiday at the Kennedy estate in Palm Beach, Florida. The Secret Service surveillance teams are closely monitoring a group of four Cubans living in Miami known to have close ties to pro-Castro activists in Havana. One of the Cubans is heard to remark, "We ought to abduct Caroline Kennedy to force the United States to stop interfering with Cuba's Castro government."