Keepers of the Keys: A History of the National Security Council from Truman to Bush PDF
Preview Keepers of the Keys: A History of the National Security Council from Truman to Bush
KEEPERS OF THE KEYS ALSO BY JOHN PRADOS The Soviet Estimate: U.S. Intelligence Analysis and Russian Military Strength The Sky Would Fall: Operation Vulture: The U.S. Bombing Mission in Indochina, 1954 The Presidents’ Secret Wars: CIA and Pentagon Covert Operations Since World War II AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA KEEPERS OF THE KEYS A H istory of the N S C ational ecurity ouncil T B from ruman to ush John Prados William Morrow and Company, Inc. New York ▼▼▼▼▼▼▼▼▼YTYYTTTYTTYTTTfTYTYTYTYYTTYTfYTfT Copyright © 1991 by John Prados All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Publisher. Inquiries should be addressed to Permissions Department, William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1350 Avenue of the Americas, New York, N.Y. 10019. It is the policy of William Morrow and Company, Inc., and its imprints and affiliates, rec ognizing the importance of preserving what has been written, to print the books we publish on acid-free paper, and we exert our best efforts to that end. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Prados, John. Keepers of the keys : a history of the National Security Council from Truman to Bush / John Prados, p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-688-07397-2 1. National Security Council (U.S.)—History. 2. United States National security—History—20th century. I. Title. UA23.15.P73 1991 353.0089—dc20 90-26244 CIP Printed in the United States of America First Edition 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 BOOK DESIGN BY M ’N O PRODUCTION SERVICES, INC. To Jill with Love FOREWORD Presidential power lies at the heart of every aspect of American government. In foreign and defense policy, so-called national security, presidential power resides in the National Security Council, or NSC. Yet for all the many, many books and other studies on aspects of American national security since World War II, hardly any have focused on the National Security Council as an expression of presidential power, or on the role of the national security adviser, the President’s first lieutenant for defense and foreign policy. Historians and political scientists have looked at Presidents and their secretaries of state, at Presidents and their sec retaries of defense, at Presidents and their personal staffs. National security advisers are largely neglected. For a moment in time it seemed that the Iran-Contra affair might change all that. Here was a case in which grave flaws in standing procedures were revealed precisely within the staff of the NSC, and in which the quality of national security advice given to a President was called into question. Three years later it is clear that the inquiries resulting from the affair have followed the angles of controversy and corruption, rather than examining fundamental issues. This is the story of the National Security Council, of the national security adviser, of his staff. It is a whale of a story, encompassing the whole history of the cold war and United States defense policy, of war in Vietnam and arms control, of Washington bureaucracies and personal frustrations. Such flamboyant advisers as Henry Kis- FOREWORD -------A ------- singer and Zbigniew Brzezinski are here, but so are some of their subordinates, the NSC staff, the people who really make the system work. Beyond individuals, this is the story of the rise of an institution, the NSC staff, which has acquired power rivaling that of Cabinet officers, diplomats, and generals. This is not a book on national security per se, or the philosophy of the national security state. As the cold war recedes, the philosophy of national security must lose much of the vitality it once possessed. Whatever the temperature of international relations, however, this nation still faces the need to integrate its defense and foreign policies, a need ever more acute as available resources become increasingly limited. The National Security Council and staff is the mechanism for achieving that integration. A practical study of where the NSC came from and what it has done seems especially timely. An abundance of material rather than its paucity has been a prob lem in writing this book. Numerous declassified documents are avail able for the administrations up to Nixon’s, and even there the record is beginning to open. For the most recent, Reagan years, the Iran-Contra affair has gen erated an avalanche of declassifications and revelations that scholars will no doubt labor for many years to interpret. This record has been supplemented by congressional documents and hearings, interviews, oral histories, memoirs, and the voluminous literature on the crises with which the NSC has had to deal. Despite its length, my account has had to pass lightly over many incidents that merit more detailed treatment, and to avoid altogether some slices of our postwar experience. Other historians will have to offer the story of the NSC in Africa, or South Asia, or more detail on relations with Europe and the Soviet Union. I have tried to follow certain subjects through the different ad ministrations nonetheless. One is the Vietnam War, which has been the formative experience for the postwar generation that rose to consciousness in the twilight of the cold war. A second is the NSC in the Middle East. I have retained material on Lebanon and the 1967 and 1973 wars for comparison and contrast of NSC activity FOREWORD -------▲------- at different times. An effort has been made to follow arms control through the administrations, as well as United States relations with the Third World in the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Cuba, Af rica, Iran, and elsewhere. Many of these subjects merit more space than I can give them. No account of the NSC staff would be complete without coverage of the Iran-Contra mess, but so much has been and will be written here that I have deliberately avoided going into great detail, and have also attempted to bring out aspects of the scandal thus far ignored. This is a story of people, not simply events, and I have tried to sketch various characters who have figured in the NSC’s history. There are, of course, many individuals important to the NSC story who have been left out. This book would have been impossible but for the help, friendship, cooperation, and assistance of many people. First I thank those who agreed to be interviewed, both on the record and off. Thanks also to the helpful librarians and staffs of the Library of Congress, Co lumbia University libraries, New York Public Library, Martin Luther King Library, and Wheaton Regional Library of Montgomery County. Providing invaluable assistance were staffs and archivists at the National Archives, Diplomatic Branch; the Harry S. Truman Library; the Dwight D. Eisenhower Library; the John F. Kennedy Library; the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library; the Nixon Library Proj ect and the National Security Archive. Audio-visual archivists at these facilities as well as at the Gerald R. Ford Library and Jimmy Carter Library, furnished prompt and courteous service. Particular thanks go to archivists Herbert Pankratz at the Eisenhower Library and David C. Humphrey at the Johnson Library. Individuals who gave generous help and assistance include Gordon Adams, Scott Arm strong, Gunter Bischof, Larry Bowers, Laurence J. Chang, David Corn, Roger V. Dingman, William Geissler, Lenny Glynn, Frank Greve, Judith Henchy, George McTurnan Kahin, William H. Kin- cade, Abbot and William Kominers, Stephen M. Katz, Robert K. Manoff, Mark Perry, D. Gareth Porter, Thomas Powers, Joseph Pra dos, Ann Sierakowski, and Dan and Ellen Wasserman. These people FOREWORD -------A ------- and institutions contributed much to what is good in what follows, but I alone am responsible for the errors and oversights. —John Prados Washington, D.C.
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