A Familiar Frontier: The Kennedy Administration in the Congo ...

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Lumumba’s erratic personal added to Dillon’s grim view of the possibility ofworking with him. When Lumumba arrived in Washington, he asked a State Departmentofficer to provide him with a blonde female companion for the evening. He asked for agun to protect himself, apparently on the advice of the CIA’s Leopoldville Station Chief,Lawrence Devlin. 40 And he smoked hemp in his room at the Blair House, leading someAmerican officials to conclude that he was a “drug addict.” 41 These factors, combinedwith Lumumba’s especially effusive praise of Khrushchev and the Soviet people,contributed to Herter’s belief that “Lumumba’s intentions and sympathies [are] unclear,and evidence exists that he will not prove satisfactory.” 42 It was around this time, at aPentagon meeting attended by representatives from the Departments of State and Defenseas well as the Joint Chiefs of Staff and CIA, that Dillon recalled first hearing about thepossibility of assassinating Lumumba, although in this instance such a course of actionwas quickly dismissed. 43That restraint would not continue for long, however. One member of the NationalSecurity Council staff, Robert H. Johnson, recollected that at one meeting, “PresidentEisenhower said something—I can no longer remember his words—that came across tome as an order for the assassination of Lumumba.” 44 He was shocked, both byEisenhower’s announcement and by the lack of reaction of others in the room, to theextent that he admitted that he “had some doubts” about Eisenhower’s meaning. Furtherevidence comes from the August 25 meeting of the Special Group, a subcommitteewithin the National Security Council which included Allen Dulles. Eisenhower’s Special40 Mahoney, JFK: Ordeal in Africa, 3941 Qtd. in Mahoney, JFK: Ordeal in Africa, 3942 Telegram from Herter to Burden, FRUS, 1958-1960, 14:38343 U.S. Senate Select Committee, Alleged Assassination Plots, 5444 U.S. Senate Select Committee, Alleged Assassination Plots, 5529
Assistant for National Security Affairs, Gordon Gray reported that “his associates hadexpressed extremely strong feelings on the necessity for very straightforward action inthis situation.” 45 Several officials later testified that “associates” was used as aeuphemistic term for Eisenhower. The Special Group went on to decide “that planningfor the Congo would not necessarily rule out ‘consideration’ of any kind of activity whichmight contribute to getting rid of Lumumba.” 46Devlin explained that in late September, he met a CIA agent identified only as“Joe from Paris,” apparently an accomplished scientist, who delivered a variety ofpoisons to Leopoldville. Joe from Paris explained that Devlin had a great deal of latitudein choosing how to eliminate Lumumba, provided that the U.S. was not implicated. Inresponse to Devlin’s concerned questions, Joe from Paris said that his orders had comefrom “the highest authority,” specifically President Eisenhower. 47 Devlin explained thathe felt “it was morally wrong for me or anyone under my orders to kill Lumumba, an actthat I could not justify by any argument or rationalization.” 48 Devlin’s account of himselfas a lone opponent of violence should invite skepticism, since he never expressed hisqualms to superiors. Ultimately, though, the delays in the program and the fact thatDevlin almost certainly did not participate in Lumumba’s eventual death give somecredence to his story.Ultimately, it is difficult to establish conclusively whether vague comments byEisenhower were intended to be used as assassination orders or not. It is certainly easy toimagine that such a lack of precision was intended to maintain plausible deniability for45 U.S. Senate Select Committee, Alleged Assassination Plots, 6046 U.S. Senate Select Committee, Alleged Assassination Plots, 6047 Kalb, The Congo Cables, xi48 Qtd. in Mazov, A Distant Front in the Cold War, 12530
Page 3: TABLE OF CONTENTSIntroduction 1Chap
Page 6 and 7: adical and his party had won a plur
Page 8 and 9: Kennedy intended it to apply to for
Page 10 and 11: in terms of American interest or to
Page 12 and 13: found a precedent in the actions of
Page 14 and 15: willingness to tolerate him because
Page 16 and 17: advisers were paying much attention
Page 18 and 19: A year later, responding to the pre
Page 20 and 21: On July 11, a few events dramatical
Page 22 and 23: Gizenga was a committed Marxist, mo
Page 24 and 25: Bandung Conference to offer a third
Page 26 and 27: the U.S.S.R. in the Congo: “For t
Page 28 and 29: Indeed, Lumumba was a wild card, an
Page 30 and 31: position from which they conspicuou
Page 34 and 35: the President, especially in writte
Page 36 and 37: took to the airwaves to dismiss Pri
Page 38 and 39: to outside world that Lumumba was b
Page 40 and 41: embassies of the U.S.S.R. and Czech
Page 42 and 43: ather than take a ministerial post
Page 44 and 45: Chapter Two:LEOPOLDVILLEEvents in t
Page 46 and 47: assessment is valid, but it had lit
Page 48 and 49: damage to his reputation among Afri
Page 50 and 51: U.S. Ambassador Clare Timberlake su
Page 52 and 53: would not respond any better to a n
Page 54 and 55: about a greater degree of Congolese
Page 56 and 57: will place yet another strain on NA
Page 58 and 59: Once again, however, State Departme
Page 60 and 61: overstepped their influence by tryi
Page 62 and 63: ecommends that we permit the presen
Page 64 and 65: States would only accept the best o
Page 66 and 67: government was “as good as we cou
Page 68 and 69: he wants Katanga to stay in Congo a
Page 70 and 71: Chapter Three:ELISABETHVILLEThe Con
Page 72 and 73: stability in Katanga, and in neighb
Page 74 and 75: eminder of the low priority that Ei
Page 76 and 77: gentle and realistic tack with the
Page 78 and 79: without too much damage in Europe.
Page 80 and 81: also warned the State Department ab
Page 82 and 83:
military action from turning into a
Page 84 and 85:
The events of August 1960 impressed
Page 86 and 87:
pointed out he had taken major risk
Page 88 and 89:
announced to the press that “this
Page 90 and 91:
evidence for such an outcome. On th
Page 92 and 93:
after the cease-fire, leading to th
Page 94 and 95:
especially by Union Miniére, which
Page 96 and 97:
ConclusionEvents in the Congo turne
Page 98 and 99:
Congo crisis began well before Amer
Page 100 and 101:
BibliographyHoskyns, Catherine. The
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