114. Memorandum From the National Intelligence Officer for Latin America (Davis) to Director of Central Intelligence Turner, the Deputy Director of Central Intelligence (Carlucci), and the Director of the National Foreign Assessment Center (Clarke)1
SUBJECT
- SCC Meeting on Cuba, 26 July 1980
1. No action required, for your information only.
2. David Aaron directed the meeting toward plans for preparation of a comprehensive set of options on the refugee issue. CIA is to assist State in developing the “Negotiation” option. DOD has the lead on the “Confrontation” option, and OMB on the “Status Quo” option.
3. Another meeting of this “working group” is scheduled for 30 July (Aaron, Eidenberg, White House; Pastor, NSC; Bushnell, Palmieri, State; White, OMB; Admiral Costello, Coast Guard; Michel, Justice; Admiral Schuler, General Johnston, DOD).
4. A meeting of principals is likely to follow shortly thereafter.
5. The Status Quo Option. Various participants anticipated an increasing leakage of boats through the Coast Guard “blockade”. The increasing cost and dangers of the inflow, even at the present rate of 500–700 a week, were depicted as “an explosive situation” by White House and OMB participants, and also by Palmieri, Coordinator for Refugee Affairs.
6. The problems surrounding the 1,700 major criminals and the 800 mentally and psychologically incompetents were labelled particularly serious. They are now held under concentration camp conditions, and legal proceedings may force their release from the camps. In recent days, some arrivals have come directly from Cuban prisons.
7. Various proposals for strengthening the “blockade” were received by Coast Guard and Justice as either ineffective, illegal, or both (e.g., closing Key West and other ports). Pleas for improved legislation and more rigorous prosecution of boat owners were noted by the Justice representative.
8. Presidential Perspective. Eidenberg and Aaron indicated that the President wanted the flow stopped—but without military confronta [Page 249] tion. The purpose of developing the “Status Quo” option was to indicate the difficulties in stopping the flow, as well as the increased costs and dangers of the present situation.
9. Negotiation Option. Negotiation with Castro was discussed more seriously than in past meetings. NIO/LA presented CIA views on Castro’s position, and recommended consideration of carrot and stick approach (some concessions about discussing other bilateral problems; warnings about confrontation), to get him to the table.
10. Confrontation Option. Various plans for forcing the “undesirables” back on Cuba have been under consideration by DOD and Coast Guard. All seem flawed. NIO/LA made the point that if the US chooses confrontation we should not complicate the problems of success by centering our action on return of the undesirables.
11. Participants agreed that all three options were difficult and unappealing. The goal of the followup meetings (first the working group, then the principals) was to prepare for the President a single document that laid out the choices, costs, and risks. Because of the much greater pressures for people to leave Cuba, the much lower tolerance of US public opinion to receive refugees, and such complications as a more vigorous Cuban-American community and the presence of the undesirables, the participants agreed that the US faced a much tougher problem than the similar Cuban refugee confrontation in the 1960s.
12. Notes.
a. Assistant Secretary Bowdler asked President Lopez Portillo to inform Castro, during his early August visit to Cuba, that the US considers the continuation of the present flow of illegal refugees as a provocative act.2
b. Aaron indicated that the White House considers large shipments of refugees (“mother boat” or flotilla) and the undesirables as more serious problems than the refugees in the US Interests Section. Even the current flow is considered more provocative than the latter problem.
c. Eidenberg indicated that President Carter’s decision on the “Blue Fire”, had it sailed with refugees was (1) let it pass out of Cuban waters without confrontation, but (2) once in US waters, prevent it from landing.
d. After the meeting, NIO/LA made the point to Deputy Assistant Secretary Busnell that though CIA had not seen all the traffic on negotiations, the Cuban insistence on linking negotiations on the refugees with [Page 250] the Guantanamo Treaty should not be taken as Castro’s “bottom line”.3 Busnell, who presumably has seen all the traffic, said the exchanges tell us “nothing” about Castro’s thinking.
- Source: Central Intelligence Agency, Office of the Director of Central Intelligence, Job 81B00112R: Subject Files, Box 16, Folder 16: (SCC) Cuba. Secret; [handling restriction not declassified].↩
- Bowdler visited Mexico in July. Lopez Portello visited Cuba from July 31 to August 3.↩
- See Document 108.↩