SECRET DECISIONS THAT ALTERED THE VIETNAM WAR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80-01601R000300360112-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 17, 2000
• Sequence Number: 112
• Publication Date: June 28, 1971
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

STATINTL '%'ORLD Pr,PO) T
JUN IT11
Approved For Release 2001103/04: CIA-RDP80-016
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. Impact of Pentagon's massive analysis of
the Government's policy'-making processes on
Vietnain?--disclosed by "The New York Times"
-extends far beyond the war itself.
'/~- ISTATINTL
In the published c!ocuments: recommend -
tions and judgments at high levels, showing
how the nation's vast n-military commitments in
the Indo-China conflict took shape.
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of secret decisions on U. S.
strategy touched off bursts
of anger in Congress and
in foreign capitals and
brought unprecedented ac-
tion by the Nixon Ad-
ministration.
The Department of jus-
tice sou,,-lit an injunction
banning further publica-
tion of material obtained
by "The Times" on the
ground that it would cause "irreparable injury
to the defense interests of
the United States."
On June 15, U. S. Dis-
trict Judge Murray I. Gur-
fcin, in. New York, is-
stied a restraining order
halting p>AOP$lve cFor
ing arguments and a i-ul-
.ing on the Government's
A FUROR over publication of secret
material on step-by-step escalation
of the U. S. role in Vietnam has taken on
far-reaching proportions.
The controversy was triggered on June
J3 when "The New York Times" began
printing a series of articles based on a
Pentagon study of how and why Amcri-
can involvement in the Indo-China .var
grew to its peak commitment of forces
totaling half a million men.
The "Times" articles included classi-
fied documents submitted to President
Johnson by advisers such as Defense
Secretary Robert S. McNamara, Director
John A. McCone of the Central Intelli-
gence Agency and White house aides
McGeorge Bundy and Wall W. Rostow;
L also texts of decisions to be implemented
'through the National Security Council
and joint Chiefs of Staff.
A bombshell effect-which Govern-
ment officials now expect to be felt for
months-increased with publication, on
June 14 and 15, of the second and third
articles in a scheduled multipart series.
Expanding repercussions. Disclosures
a ~ ""=bn :n" n` {~ n .n ~t~ v ruing the 1964
616 step, fen "Se ~rjr lcl4 ~Fj.'S r qr1'03~~mpai n th L'Nlr. _1p1ui-
"Times" focused on top-level documents that shaped strategy.
demand for a permanent injunction.
White House officials said action was
taken against "The Tinies" not only be-
cause U. S. interests were clamageil, but
for the further reason that publication
of classified documents, if unchallenged,
would set a dangerous precedent.
"Responsibility to publish." Gist of
the stand taken by "The Times" was ex-
pressed in an editorial on June 16, in
these words:
"A fundamental responsibility of the
press in this democracy is to publish
information that helps the people of the
United Slates to understand the pro-
cesses of their own Government, especial-
ly when those processes have been
clouded over in a veil of public dis-
simulation and even deception."
While the Federal Bureau of Investi-
gation and other arms of the Govern-
ment sought to fix responsibility for the
leak of the secret material to "The
Tinlcs," diplomatic and congressional
reverberations continued.
Secretary of State William P. Rogers
told a news conference on Jude 15 that
winning friends with his
apparent sincerity and
humanity he was, . at the
same ` time, provoking
North Vietnam into an es-
calated war.
The Paris newspaper
"France Soir" said the
"Times" articles show that
"in order to attack North
Vietnam" IN-Ir. Johnson
"misled Congress."
On Capitol Hill, sharp
comment came from Sen-
ator Barry ' 'Gold vatfi?
(Rep.), of Arizona, who
was Lyndon Johnson's op-
ponent in the 1964 presi-
delitial race.
publication of the articles was a vio-
lation of the law on secret documents
and a "very serious matter" that would
cause a "great deal of difficulty for
the U. S. in its relations with foreign
governments.
Mr. Rogers said that the State De-
partment had received diplomatic in-
quiries from other governments express-
ing concern about the articles and raising
questions as to whether those govern-
ments could be sure of dealing withh the
U. S. on a confidential basis.
"Deliberate esculofion.." The Conl-
munist world was quick to react. '1'lic
Soviet news agency, Tass, asserted that
the documents published in the "Times"
series "confirm the United States de-
liberately escalated and broadened the
war in Indo-Cllina, and misled the
American public in giving its reasons for
doing so."
In Australia-wlliclh has contributed
troops to the Vietnam war effort-"The
Sydney Daily Mirror" declared in ,in
editorial that the secret Pentagon papers
"show that while President Johnson was
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To see the conflict and our part in it
as a tragedy without villains, sear crimes
without criminals, lies without liars, es-
pottses and promulgates a view of pro-
cess, roles and motives that is not only
grossly mistaken but which underwrites
deceits that have served a succession of
Presidents.
HE, issues were momentous, the sit-
uation unprecedented. The most mas-
sive leak of secret documents in U.S.
history had suddenly exposed the sen-
Isitive inner processes whereby the John-
!'son Administration had abruptly esca-
lated the nation's most unpopular-and
unsuccessful-war. The Nixon Govern-
ment, battling stubbornly to withdraw
from that war at its' own deliberate
pace, took the historic step of seeking
to suppress articles before publication,
and threatened criminal action against
JULY 1965: JOHNSON DISCUSSING VIET NAM POLICY BEFORE TELEVISION SPEECH
Always the secret option, another notch, but never victory.
that the Government 'was fighting so
fiercely to protect. Those records af-
forded a rare insight into how high of-
ficials make decisions affecting the lives
of millions as well as the fate of na-
tions. The view, however constricted or
incomplete, was deeply disconcerting.
The records revealed a dismaying de-
gree of miscalculation, bureaucratic ar-.
rogance and deception. The revelations
severely damaged the reputations of
some officials, enhanced those of a few,
and so angered Senate Majority Lead-
er Mike Mansfield--a long-patient Dem-
ocrat whose own party was hurt most
-that he promised to conduct a Sen-
ate investigation of Government decision
making.
The sensational affair began quietly
with the dull thud of the 486-page Sun-
day New York Tinies arriving on door-
steps and in newsrooms. A dry Page
One headline--VIETNAM ARCHIVE PEN-
John Mitchell charged that the Times's'
disclosures would cause "irreparable in-':
jury to the defense of the United States"
and obtained a temporary restraining
order to stop the series after three in-
stallments, worldwide attention was in-
evitably assured.
A Study Ignored
STATINTL
The Times had obviously turned up
a big story (see ?PREss). Daniel Ells-
berg, a former Pentagon analyst and su-
perhawk-turned-supeideve, apparently
had felt so concerned about his in-
volvement in the Viet Nam tragedy
that he had somehow conveyed about
40 volumes of an extraordinary Pen-
tagon history of. the war to the news-
paper. Included were 4,000 pages of
documents, 3,000 pages of analysis and
2.5 million words-al] classified as se-
cret, top secret or top secret-sensitive.
The study was begun in 1967 by See-
the nation's most eminent newspaper. TAGON STUDY TRACES 3 DECADES of retary of Defense Robert McNamara,
The dramatic collision between the GROWING U.S. INVOLVEMENT--Was fol- who had become disillusioned by the fu-
Nixon Administration and first the New lowed by six pages of deliberately low- tility of the war and wanted future his-'
York Times, then the Washington Post, key prose and column after gray col- torians to he able to determine what
raised in a new and spectacular form umn of official cables, memorandums had gone wrong. For more than 'a year,
the unresolved constitutional questions and position papers. The mass of ma- 35 researchers, including Ellsberg, Rand
about the Government's right to keep terial seemed to repel readers and even Corporation experts, civilians and uni-
its planning papers secret' and the con- other newsmen. Nearly a day went by be- formed Pentagon personnel, worked out
Ilicting right of a free press to inform fore the networks and wire services of an office adjoining McNamara's. With
the pnbli MQedrF' eI?ase 01'1013/(T4e:.IARiDF"'0i(6 0 1b 0 ? v.1 pble to obtain
tioned (secs .story page 17). Yet, even action was to retrain- from comment so en agora ocut~ins._filtihn_hacl tor-
--more--fundamental, the.legal -battle _fo.__ns..not..to_giv_e_the_series any greater "ex- _._guments_ within the Truman Adminis-
cused natilttention on the records ore." But when Attorney General tration on 'whether the--U.S. should help
 e(1, C(.vt ? t e Yoe- kT,
NEWSW EE:i
j G^t ifl_~ ~?~"' and Rusk were against it or a long tlmc,.
White House and State Department Teo- the military recommendation on five clif-
orcls, which shows they didn't try. very ferent occasions-in November and Do-
ords If they honest the comber 1964 and oil Jan. 2, 1965. Final-
themselves. they would ly, oil Feb. 7, 1965, with the approval of
have diqualied were
Some of The New York Times digest concerned, he OK'd the
bombing with the idea that it would be a
of the Pentagon study was objective. deterrent to the north. [Johnson's recol-
But parts of it might have been written lection now is at variance with at least
by John Kenneth Galbraith. Over all, one past version. Five years ago, he told.
it was dishonest-one distorted and bi-. NL??VS\VEEK'S Charles Roberts, then the
ased side of the picture. And all the cir- magazine's White House correspondent,
curnstanecs surrounding the leak collie that lie had made, the decision in Octo-
close to treason. The danger now is that bur 1964 during the Presidential cam-
President Nixon will be pressured to get paign.] He hadn't said in his campaign
out of Vietnam before achieving the that he would never commit Americans
main objective-getting South Vietnam in to fight in Vietnam. In Now Hampshire,
shape to protect itself. be said that Asians should fight their own
C 1
O
b
h
d
h
The man in the eye of the storm, Lyn-
don B. Johnson, maintained a calm, and
some thought stoic, silence last week,
turning away interviewers who wanted
his reaction to the top-secret Pentagon
study of his stewardship of the war.
Froln Austin, he passed the word that
all questions" raised by the Pentagon pa-
ers %voulcl be answered in his own book,
he Vantage Point," to be published
next fall and that he was making "no
changes" in the galleys to accommodate
the-new disclosures. -But behind his si-
lence, Johnson was naturally concerned
.about the study and its treatment in the
press. Those in Austin privy to his feel-
ings sketch this picture-.
?
lie ghostly hand of Robert Kennedy is
~M on the Pentagon study. Bobby in-
deed may well have inspired the report.
He. was close to Robert McNamara and
oel"v ices Committee, and Arkansas's J.
- istration was doing. Russell said so, but
challenge to Johnson in 1968. He The-first -Gulf of Tonkin resolution ac-
couldn't find any weakness in the John- tually was prepared by Senate leaders.
son record on civil rights, race, health, But it was too complicated to be under-
education, environment or anything else. standable, and Johnson objected. So the
He pinned his hopes on Vietnam, and senators asked the Administration to )re-
McNamara was a Kennedy man. In fact, pare a simplified version and said they
the whole Pentagon Establishment was would adopt it. They all participated.
Kennedy. Johnson left it.intact. He trust- The government had radio intercepts
eel. McNamara-in fact told him once that showing that North Vietnam ordered tor-
if McNamara quit he would have him ar- pedo attacks on the U.S. destroyers in
rested and brought back. Tonkin Gulf. Fulbright has forgotten that,
McNamara, while in the process of be- too-now he claims it was all a fraud--but
coming disillusioned with the war, went he knew it at the time. The resolution
to the Kennedy Center in Cambridge, authorizing Johnson to do what he
Mass., and talked with about twenty thought needed doing from then on was
Harvard professors around the time he adopted unanimously by the House and
'ordered the study. Some of those twenty with two opposing votes in the Senate.
,
may be among the authors of the report . The two dissenters may have been mending "no new peace initiatives" on
somebody should find out who they are wrong, but they were at least honest ' Vietnam and advocating the callup of
and who wrot i cis he has a
committed. 1;f --Pl t r ----- '0 iffa104 :, C~1~4fR to - 16 0 1 i c o ammunition-and 1
t i _mw .i any-wan. e o uison on to onib..-pretty goo( pi c o aitihis
lec.tive report. They didnt try to get long before he did. But both McNamara book will m ake pretty goozl ttsc o it.-_
ne o Jo inson s
ig
ea
ac
es when wars, but in context he wasn't promising
he took over the Presidency and the war not to help.
effort was the political instability of die
government in Saigon following the over- The Deserters
throw and murder of President Ng' In January 1965, McNamara and Mc-?
Dinh Dian in 1963. One of the first George Bundy were urging strong meas-
things Johnson did was to call in MCNa res against North Vietnam. They argued.
mara, Dean Rusk, CIA director John McAlat the time had come for full use of
Cone and Henry Cabot Lodge-all JFK American power. Either get in or get out,
holdovers-and object to what had been they said. At that point, Rusk didn't
done. W1 hile JFK was out of 1Vashiugton, agree with them. He wasn't for getting
a cable from Roger IIilsman, the State out but neither was he for a big escala-
Departnient's director of Intelligence Lion. He finally did agree with McNa-
ancl Research, gave "a green light" for niara and Bundy the following June and
the coup. That was inexcusable. July, and Johnson issued the orders. Ev-
The Senators ' eryb-ody agreed by then. Some became
disillusioned even before leaving the
Critics now were trying to make it government. Bundy was the first to aban-
seem that he had decided in 1964 to don shi
and McNamara was next
It
p
.
bomb in 1.965, that his campaign was a might have been weakness of character.
lie and that lie was trying to put some- Lately Clark Clifford has been saying
thing over on Congress. That just wasn't that he had orders from Johnson only to
so. There were contingency plans for Vi- find out how to escalate further. But
ctnam. There are contingency plans for Johnson has a copy of his order to Clif-
bombing Moscow; that doesn't mean that ford-initialed by Clifford when he re-
Moscow is going to be bombed. Johnson ceived it- telling him to make a broad
y
.
p
about major moves. Georgia's Richard, In, of orders (".liffnrcl gave to suborrli-
'stud
of all alternatives
He also has co
-
His own book, in fact, draws - on 31
iillion documents on file at the LBJ
several memos from men such as Bundy,
Clifford and McNamara, urging a
stepped-up war effort. One of his fa-
vorites, already surfaced in the Tinies,
shows McNamara proposing on March
10, 1964-five months before the Tonkin
Gulf incident and eleven months before
the Viet Cong attack on Pleiku-that the
U.S. should be ready for "retaliation"
against North Vietnam on three days'
notice. Another shows that Bundy, in
Saigon at the time of the Pleiku attack,
came back to Washington urging "sus-
tained reprisal" bombing attacks against
North Vietnam, the policy Johnson
adopted. And the former President has
a memorandum showing that Clifford
-as late as March 4
1968-was reconl-
 Approved For Release 2001103/04: CIA-RDP80-01601
Q 1 r,~~~M.1 L_ 28 JUN 971
n-oz nomi)er raw in 1965: Early in the war, the U.S. ran out of alternatives to pressure. Ar
Th War. Ac c~~~ phi to -tGuu 1-,)) en u on
Papers,
arhe secret Vietnam study commis- the wartime Johnson era. But even when not-as is often alleged-connive with
sioned by Robert McNamara is a his- it concentrates on the L13J years, the Diem to ignore the elections. And al-
torian's dream and a statesman's night- Pentagon study is by no means the final though Dwight Eisenhower permitted
mare. With the story splashed on page word. It provides a fascinating peek into the military to draw up contingency plans
one, A)nericans have for the first time the government's files, but it contains for American intervention in Laos and
been able to read sonic of the crucial few White House or State Department Vietnam, he decided against such a step
secret documents of a war that is still records of the period. It also draws on when Dulles failed to line up support
being fought. The Pentagon papers are, few of the private memorandums that from America's allies.
at best, only an incomplete account of McNamara, Rusk and others wrote for By the time Lyndon Johnson took of-
America's slide into the Vietnam quag- the President, and it shows no trace of flee, the situation in South Vietnam had
mire. But they are also a revealing-arid the many private, soul-searching con- worsened. Diem had been assassinated,
deeply disturbing-account of the delu- versations between top officials. Flawed and the sac] series of revolving-door jun-
sions, deceptions and honest errors of as a current account, the study is no less tas that followed him were fast losing
judgment that propelled the United seriously flawed as a retrospective be- their grip on the country. "We should
States into a destructively unpopular war. cause the Pentagon analysts were not watch the situation very carefully," Do-
The initial installments published by permitted to interview the principal fense Secretary 'McNamara wrote in Do
The New York Times and The Washing- players in the drama,
ton Post transfix* some members of Lyn- But despite those shortcomings, the name"runningftscared,srhopinglrfor`Ttl e
don Johnson's Administration in a more!- study is invaluable. The Eisenhower era best, but preparing for more forceful
less spotlight. McNamara labors on as the material-first printed in The Washing- moves if the situation does not show
war's most tireless technocrat even after ton Post-strikes many of the notes that early signs of improvement." This con-
he has begun to lose heart for the fight. were to echo throughout America's in- corn was by no means confined to secret
Walt Whitman Rostov clings doggedly volvement in Vietnam. There is the government deliberations. By March
to the assumption that America is simply strong assumption that the stakes ex- 1964, Sen. J. William Fulbright was
too powerful to be thwarted. Maxwell tend beyond Indochina to all of Asia, warning Congress that there were "only
Taylor, the humanist general for whom and that the U.S. is embroiled in a proxy two realistic options open to us in. Vict-
Robert Kennedy named one of his sons, confrontation with Communist China. nam in the immediate future: the. ex-
blusters like a pouty proconsul. And the There are the efforts to solve problems pansion of the conflict in one way or
Bundy brothers grind out options to or- by backstage maneuvering. And, above another or a renewed effort to bolster
der, while generals and admirals con- all, there is Washington's repeated in- the capacity of the South Vietnamese to,
stantly promote the idea that more is ability to make events in Indochina coil- prosecute the war successfully on its
butter. form to its desires. present scale." And as the mood of crisis
Other reputations gain from the expo- A deepened, many newspapers-includin
sure. George Ball's standing as a presci- Vote Against Elections g
The New York Times-varied against
ent dove is enhanced by the tone of his In 1954, Secretary of State John Poster the possible loss of South Vietnam to the
memorandums, and the intelligence serv- Dulles fought hard but unsuccessfully at Communists.
ices--particularly the CIA-weigh in with the Geneva conference on Indochina to But although the American people
advice that, in retrospect, often seems prevent the scheduling of elections in were well aware that things were going
to have been dead right. The spotlight Vietnam which, he feared, "might even- badly in South Vietnam-an awareness
skips over still other key policymakers. tually mean unification [of] Vietnam un- that would be heightened during the
1)ean Rusk figures only rarely in most of der Ho Chi Minh." But despite Dulles's Coldwater-Johnson election cam paign-a
.the narrative.-And except for brief all- strong stand, the U.S. backed away from whole spectrum of undercover activities.
pearances, the most important actor of taking overt action on its own in Tilde- was kept secret from them. The Yenta-',
all-Lyndon Johnson-broods alone in the china. In 1955, when South Vietnamese gon papers show that on Feb. 1., 1964,
.middle distance. strongman Ngo Dinh Dlenl refused even an elaborate program of covert military
The material that was oracle public to consider holding elections, Washin r- ,
covers a period e r o )orations a li 1C l sja e,,o Forth Vi-
over the period r'in-d cY ale lCl lR~P -01 sir #d ode name
r 1' c es on agora aua ysrs declares "The U
S
did O
-
.
.
peration Plan 34A. Directed
front
 Approved For Release 2002M3 1(dlA-RDP80-01
`BREACH OF SECU R Y2
WASHINGTON - It is interesting - and -of decision-making at the highest lev-
rather wryly amusing-to juxtapose a els of government." Although the
couple of editorials that have appeared Times, fortunately, could not know it
in The New York Times. One appeared at the time, the article had been read
on June 1.6 after a Federal judge or- in advance (anti rather badly edited)
dered the Times to suspend publiction by no less an authority on national seen-
, the top-secret Pentagon studies of rity than the President of the United
the U.S. role in Vietnam. States. It contained no word from any
The Times called this. "an unprece- NSC paper, or from any other secret
dented example of censorship," which document. -
indeed it is. But then, the verbatim
ublieation of great masses of top-se-
p
cret papers is also unprecedented. The writers' reasons for writing the
"What was the reason that impelled article were perhaps less lofty than
The Times to publish this material in those claimed by the Times in its re-
the first place?" the Times asks rhetori- cent editorial. They included a desire
cally. "The basic reason is, as was stated to do a good reportorial job (the ac-
in our original reply to Mr. Mitchell, count was later confirmed in detail in
that we believe `that it is in the interest Robert Kennedy's book on the Cuban
of the people of this country to be in- crisis). They even included a desire to
formed' ..." The editorial continues on make a bit of money. But like most re-
that lofty note: "We publish the docu- porters, we also believed that "it is in
meats and related running account not . the interest of the people of this couu
to prove any debater's point ... but to try to be informed ..."
present to the American public a his- No doubt a desire to inform the peo-
tory-admittedly incomplete--of deci- ple was a major reason for the Times's
sion-making at the highest levels of decision to publish the secret papers:
government ..." But (to adopt the Tinmes's own rhelorf-
The other editorial, which was even. cal style) might there not have been
more righteously outraged, appeared other reasons too? Does it not matter a
in the Times some years ago. It was en- great deal to the Times who does the
titled "Breach of Security," and it de- informing? Is it not the Times's criterion
nounced an article "purporting to tell that if the Times does the informing,
what went on in the executive commit- that is in the national interest, and if
tee of the National Security Council ... somebody else does it, that is "a
The secrecy of one of the highest or- breach of security"?
,gaus of the United States has been se- And is the Times really indifferent
riously breached." to whether or not the information,
'MC CAItTHY TECHNIQUE' which it is "in the interest of the
people of this country" to publish,
"What kind of advice can the Presi-
dent expect to get under such circum-
stances?" the Times asked, again rhe-
torically. "flow can there be any real
,freedom of discussion or of dissent; how
can anyone be expected to advance
positions that may be politically unpop-
ular or unprofitable? Does no. one in
Washington recall the McCarthy era
and the McCarthy technique? ... The
various positions of the members of the
NSC taken during deliberation must
remain secret . . . The integrity of the
,National Security Council, and of the
advice received 'by the President, is
at strike."
The article that inspired the Times
to this burst of righteous indignation
was a Saturday Evening Post piece on
he Cuban missile crisis by Charles
,
V Bartlett and this writer. It too was an Vietnamese to their fate. 'modern history. Yet those who wait this public a "tA pro /iedcl ?~Iko> axe prO0'~ ~vI~at they ~lQ1F in 01 iiar a Flo g wait. I)ar-attemt
supports the views of the Times? The
article that so enraged the Times
pictured the late Adlai Stevenson, then
a major Times icon, in a somewhat
dubious light, and that perhaps had
something to do with the rage. The
Times has long passionately supported
the cause that the leaking of the Pen-
tagon papers was obviously intended
to serve.
The purloined papers printed by
the Times were first offered to Sen.
George McGovern and Rep. Paul Mc-
Closkey, the leading doves in the Sen-
ate and ]louse. Obviously, the purpose
of the leak was to prove that this coun-
try became involved in Vietnam by a
process of stealthy deception; and that
therefore the United States should
leaving the South
withdraw forthwith
prove. Allowing for the need for con-
tingency planning, and allowing also
for Lyndon Johnson's well-known pas=
sion for concealment, there is less de-
ception of the public in the docu-
ments than self-deception.
There is the ancient American illu-
sion that wars can be won cleanly in
the air, rather than bloodily on the
ground, of course. But the basic self-
deception was the illusion that, if the
United States could only find the right
combination of sticks and carrots, the
Vietnamese Communists would (in.
Robert McNamara's phrase) "move to
a settlement by negotiation." The un-
swerving goal of the Communists, then.
and now, was and is the imposition of.
Communist rule on all former Trench
Indochina. There is no stick short of
"bombing then) back to the stone age,"
and no carrot short of turning Saigon
over to their tender mercies, that will
divert them from that goal.
No American President who was
also an honorable and humane man
could hit thorn with that stick, or of-
fer them that carrot. Yet the illusion
that the North Vietnamese are capa-
ble of "reasonable" compromise is
amazingly persistent, especially among
liberal Democrats-its most recent
manifestation is the "Clifford Plan,"
strongly supported by the Times.
NONSENSE
Despite its ineffable self-righteous-
ness, the Times is certainly a great pa-
per, though not as great as when it
had the Herald Tribune to worry about.
Moreover, anyone who has been
around Washington for some time
knows that a lot of governmental non-'
sense has been perpetrated in the
name of "security." Most reasonably
diligent reporters, including this one,
have been investigated by the govern-
ment for publishing information the
government found it inconvenient to
have published.
Yet surely there is a problem of
security worth worrying about when
"the various positions of the members
of 'the NSC," as well as National Intel-
ligence Estimates and secret' coded
messages from foreign governments,
are reproduced verbatim in great
quantities. Indeed, the Times series,.
by the Times's own standards, is the,
most serious "breach of security" in
tJ