THE PRESIDENT'S DAILY BRIEF 7 JUNE 1968

• Document Type: FOIA
• Collection: President's Daily Brief 1961-1969
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): 0005976188
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 11
• Document Creation Date: September 16, 2015
• Document Release Date: September 16, 2015
• Publication Date: June 7, 1968

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The President's Daily Brief
-'74qrSe.gza__ 7 June 1968
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THE PRESIDENT'S
DAILY BRIEF
7 JUNE 1968
1. Czechoslovakia
We have confirmation
that Dubcek was
pressed by the Soviets to make
that his reform movement did not
out of Communist control,
hard
sure
slip
The
new Czech leaders
decided that they could sal- 50X1
vage most of their liberalization pro-
gram but that they would have to meet a
number of Soviet demands. As a result,
they partially revved up again the par-
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and to new non-Communist political
groups.
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2. Panama
They also decided that it would be
necessary as well to follow through
soon on the promises contained in the
action program. A way had to be found
to make news media more responsive,
but without reintroducing censorship.
The course of events since these
decisions has pretty much followed the
plan, except that pressures for speed-
ier liberalization in the country ap-
parently were stronger than the leader-
ship anticipated. Some modifications
have been made in that direction, but
only enough to gain a respite. Clearly,
Dubcek will have serious difficulty
satisfying both the Soviets and his own
people, particularly liberals who will
be pressing for even more reforms to be
put on the agenda of a special party
congress in September.
Arias, at his request, had a cor-
dial conversation with Ambassador Adair
on Tuesday. In the course of stressing
his wish for better relations with the
US, Arias intimated that a request for
budgetary support might become necessary.
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3. Philippines
4. Communist China
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The appropriation bill- for the
civic action group in Vietnam is still
languishing, primarily for want of a
hard push fromllarcos. One Senate op-
position figure, whose vote could break
the deadlock when the special session
convenes next month, says he will,go
along only if another does. The other,
arguing that the opposition cannot be'
expected to lead the drive, apparently
is waiting for Marcos to lay, his domes-
tic political prestige on the line for
:the bill.
There is further evidence of the
bad effect the Cultural Revolution is
having on exports. Western traders at
the recent Canton trade fair complained
that Chinese export goods were in short
supply and high priced. Exports to
Japan in the first four months of this
year were about 40 percent lower than
in the previous four-month period.
5., Middle East - In the coffee houses and the edi-
Kennedy Assassi- tonal pages of the sensational press,
nation the Arabs are calling the Kennedy assas-
sination a "Zionist plot." They see it
as intended to sour Arab relations with
the US. Responsible Arab newspapers
and officials, however, soberly denounce
the crime and stress that it will prob-
ably provoke strong anti-Arab sentiment
in the US.
In Israel, one popular .and strongly
nationalistic paper has attempted to
link the assassination to an Arab inter-
national conspiratorial group patterned
on pre-Israel Zionist terrorist organi-
zations, It points out that the assassin
transferred Arab world political assas-
sination to America. Another paper
blames the act on an Arab incitement cam-
paign.
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Soviet Ships Near the Canary Islands
Hydroacoustic Research Ship
E-II Class Nuclear Submarine
Submarine Rescue Ship
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6. Soviet Union
7. Soviet Union
The Soviets show a rather unusual
? interest in the Atlantic around the
Canary Islands. They have sent expedi-
tions to the area almost yearly since
1963--the latest one was there in the
last half of May. This activity is
definitely related to submarine opera-
tions; this year a nuclear-powered sub-
marine worked with a group of research
ships.
This part of the Atlantic is gen-
erally calm, has good conditions for
sonar work, and is off the beaten path.
Just what the Russians are up to is
not certain. One good possibility is
that they have in mind eventually set-
ting up a mobile support base for sub-
marine operations. The position would
be a good staging point between home
ports and the US coast.
Satellite photography shows that
the new space launch complex at Tyura-
tam is nearing the end of construction.
This is the launch center for the So-
viet programs to land a man on the
moon and to place a large manned space
station into orbit around the earth.
We do not, however, expect an at-
tempt at a manned lunar landing before
mid-1971, nor the orbiting of the space
station before the mid-1970s.
8. Communist China - There are signs that Peking is
Burma trying to make up with Rangoon. Rela-
tions have been at a low ebb since
last summer, when the Chinese Communist
embassy in Rangoon sponsored Maoist
"revolutionary" activity that led to
anti-Chinese rioting.
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Top Secret
FOR THE PRESIDENT'S EYES ONLY
1.) Special Daily Report on North Vietnam
2.) North Vietnamese Reflections of U S
Political Attitudes
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16
7 June 1968
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Special Daily Report on North Vietnam
for the President's Eyes Only
7 June 1968
I. NOTES ON THE SITUATION
More Vietnamese to Paris: Hanoi continues to
dispatch more people to Paris. The latest group is
legal talent
Hanoi said they were going to Paris
"for a job of brief duration with the North Vietnam-
ese delegation."/
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Doumer Bridge: Permanent repairs to the Paul
Doumer Bridge are nearly half completed. Photog-
raphy of 23 and 27 May shows three of seven dropped
bridge spans are in place and work completed on
damaged or improvised piers. At the present rate of
construction the remaining four spans could be in
place by mid-June and the bridge open to rail traf-
fic soon after. A large barge crane and steel truss
bridge spans were first noted near the Doumer bridge
in mid-May photography.
The destruction of the Doumer bridge, although
an impediment to traffic crossing the Red River,
never halted the movement of supplies into Hanoi.
There are 18 rail and highway by-passes to the Doumer
bridge.
II. NORTH VIETNAMESE REFLECTIONS OF US POLITICAL
ATTITUDES ON THE WAR
Paris Delegation on Senator Kennedy: Officially,
the North Vietnamese in Paris have refrained from any
comment on the death of Senator?Robert Kennedy. The
press spokesman for the delegation said yesterday
that it was "the concern of the US and the American
people." A Reuters correspondent in Paris, however,
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apparently found a North Vietnamese who was willing
to comment, but not to be identified. This unnamed
person claimed that the North Vietnamese saw a "cer-
tain connection" between the shooting of President
Kennedy in Dallas, his brother in Los Angeles, and-
Martin Luther King in Memphis.
Hanoi Radio on Senator Kennedy: Hanoi Radio
yesterday commented on Senator Kennedy's death. In
a broadcast to Southeast Asia in English, Hanoi
said that "world public opinion is unanimous that
with the assassination, US prestige in the world has
further declined. Many foreign papers have pointed
out that the assassination was part and parcel of
the plot of US ruling circles to eliminate one an-
other in their race for power."
Similar but briefer comments were made by Hanoi
Radio in Vietnamese to South Vietnam, and in English
to American troops in the South.
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