BEHEIREN AND THE FOUR U.S. NAVY DESERTERS.
Originator: CIA
From: KARAMESSINES, THOMAS H., DEPUTY DIR
To: ROSTOW, WALT W., SPECIAL ASSISTANT
Document date: 01/10/1968
Document type: PAPER - TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

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1104-10064-10013 — 2022 RELEASE UNDER THE PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY ASSASSINATION RECORDS ACT OF 1992

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CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY

WASHINGTON, D.C.

20505

10 JAN 1968

MEMORANDUM FOR:

The Honorable Walt W. Rostow

Special Assistant to the President

SUBJECT

Bebeiren and the Four U.S. Navy Deserters

1.

The following information on Beheiren was compiled

by a representative of this Agency in Tokyo and comprises

his personal interpretation and knowledge based on overt

and covert information available to our Station in Tokyo

as of 20 December 1967. Copies of this memorandum are

being furnished to Director, Naval Investigative Service;

Assistant Chief of Staff, Intelligence, Department of the

Army; Deputy

of State; Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation; Chief,

Counterintelligence Division, Directorate of Special

Investigations,

Inspector General, USAF; Commandant,

Headquarters United

States Marine Corps; and Chief,

Counterintelligence & Security Office (DIACI), Defense

Intelligence Agency.

This report partially answers DIA

letter S-4845/CI-4 of 29 December 1967 and oral requests

of similar nature from the Department of the Navy.

2.

Summary

of the Japan

On 13 November 1967, when the leaders

"Peace for Vietnam" Committee (Beheiren)

dramatically announced at a press conference in Tokyo

that four. U.S. sailors from the aircraft carrier USS INTREPID

had deserted

their ship because of opposition of the Vietnam

War, the name Beheiren suddenly assumea a degree of prominence.

The four sailors' successful flight to Moscow, with Beheiren

aid, where the Soviet propaganda machinery proceeded to

make capital out of this windfall, has kept Beheiren in the

public spotlight in succeeding weeks.

The incident has

already stimulated a new would-be defection case involving

two sailors from Yokosuka U.S. Navy Base, and Beheiren

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Itself has tried to keep the "desertion mood" alive by:

organizing a new group to promote and aid the defection of

future U.S. military servicemen in Japan. End of Summary:

3:

Following is information on Beheiren and 1ts involve-

ment in the case of the four, U.S. Navy deserters.

Origin and Development of Beheiren

(1) Founding: Beheiren was organized in

April 1965, nominally as a politically inde-

pendent group of intellectuals and cultured

persons whose purpose was "to help restore

(JCP) members, progressive intellectuals,

leftist cultured persons, and leftwing students -

banded together in the namé of opposition to the.

Vietnam War by two common denominators; dedicated

anti-Americanism and refusal to be

dominated or

controlled by the orthodox JCP:

(2) Hard-Core Secretariat:

The real force

behind the organization of Beheiren has been

a brillant Communist named YOSHIKAWA Yuichi,

whose conspiratorial organizational skills have

been perhaps the most indispensable ingredients

in Beheiren's development.

YOSHIKAWA was expelled

from Tokyo University for

his role as an All-

Japan Federation of Student Self-Government

Associations (Zengakuren) leader in the 1960

U.S.-Japan Security Treaty riots. He then went

'into full time JCP mass movement professional

work, becoming the Secretariat official in

charge of international relations for the Japan

Peace Committee.

YOSHIKAWA broke with the JCP

in late 1964, following the rupture in relations

between the JCP and the Communist Party of the

Soviet Union (CPSU) in May that year.

The inspir-

ation for Beheiren springs in large measure from

YOSHIKAWA's personal desire to use his organiza-

tional talents

'in countering the JCP and its

Japan Peace Committee.

YOSHIKAWA, in addition

to being a well qualified English

linguist him-

self, years ago surrounded himself with a small

following of similarly qualified lieutenants,

whom he brought along into Beheiren to give him

the necessary depth and experience

to run this

new organization.

YOSHIKAWA

functions as

Beheiren's Secretary General.

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Matrit

(3) Respectable Intellectual Front: Following

fundamental Communist principles for mass move-

ment work, the ex-JCP organizers of Beheiren: m'

kept themselves in the background and lined up

a number of prominent Japanese progressive

intellectuals and leftist cultured persons to

front for Beheiren.

The choice of ODA Makoto,

ex-Fulbrighter and popular young novelist, to

be the Chairman was a fortunate move for

Beheiren.... ODA has taken to this front work

like a duck to water.

It has given him a

chance to give unbridled vent to his own latent

anti-American feelings, puffed him up to the

extent that he has been dubbed "the emperor"

by other Beheiren activists, and given him at

long last an ideological mission to pursue.

YOSHIKAWA has performed magnificently in feeding

ODA's ego needs and in infusing and indoctrina-

ting ODA so that his words and actions take on

sufficiently virulent anti-American overtones.

ODA has served another vital function for

Beheiren by recruiting a sizable number of

fellow intellectuals to join the ranks of

Beheiren activists:

(See paragraph 4 for a

listing of a number. of those Japanese who have

been identified as

_active Beheiren supporters

or sympathizers.):

(4): Organizational Development: In its two

and one-half year history, Beheiren has not

changed appreciably its organizational format,

although it has moved its office three times

and modified its name even oftener.

Beheiren

15 not a "mass organization," because it has

had no sizable: popular backing to the present

time.

Its.hard core, secretariat organization

15 run by YOSHIKAWA and his lieutenants. Its

public image, intellectual front is led by ODA,

and given body by a score of like-minded intel-

lectual friends of ODA and YOSHIKAWA, who

form

the loose body of Beheiren's activist leadership.

Under this Beheîren leadership superstructure

lies a base of only several hundred Beheiren

"rank-and-file" supporters, mostly young Japanese

students.

Organizationally, Beheiren has no

formal membership system, so its base of support-

ers is

fluid and not precisely measurable.

However, the base support for Beheiren has

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definitely been on the upswing during 1967, and

made such notable strides during the past summer

that JCP Headquarters officials finally felt

constrained to note with concern that Beheiren

was beginning to drain off a growing number of

progressive youth who otherwise would have been

absorbed into the JCP's own youth movement.

Beheiren leaders have tried to help this growth

along by setting up a youth section, calling it

"Young Beheiren."

Beheiren's imaginative actions

and publicity-conscious programs have been

responsible for its recent growth, and this

period of growth seems to be now on the verge

of really gaining momentum. As a result of its

role in the case of the four deserting sailors,

Beheiren has reaped bountiful publicity, has

succeeded in touching a delicate Japanese public.

nerve of sympathy and pacifism, opening a flood-

gate of support for Beheiren from all over Japan.

When this' case fades from the limelight, it is

still most likely that a fair percentage of the

current wave of popular support for Beheiren

will solidify into permanent mass backing,

giving Beheiren, for the first time, a meaning-

ful base to support its future activities.

(5)

Activities and Accomplishments:

Beheiren

has engaged in a number of propaganda actions,

and participated in international anti-Vietnam

War activities.

It has tried to cooperate with

certain front activities in Japan controlled by

the JCP, most notably the Japan Committee to

Investigate War Crimes in Vietnam activities,

which culminated in the Tokyo Court of August

1967, but has been soundly and rudely rebuffed

In spite of this, Beheiren has

along at its own pace, with a continu-

1ng series of anti-Vietnam War actions, most of

them related in some way to the American pacifist

movement. In this regard, Beheiren has succeeded

in cornering a virtual monopoly on Japanese

contacts with U.S. pacifist movements and

effectually capitalized on this to promote its

own action program.

The case of the four

deserting sailors,

while an apparent lucky

windiaft for Beheiren, only points up the fact

that Beheiren,

through past organizational work

and promotional activities, was ready and capable

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(unique in Japan in this regard) to take the

ball and run with it.

Beheiren ran all the way

and scored its most notable success since it was

organized. (Paragraph 5 contains a listing of

Beheiren's more notable activities since its

founding.

Paragraph, 6 is a partial listing of

foreigners who have been in contact with or

cooperated with Beheiren.)

The Case of the Four Sailor Deserters and

Beheiren

(1) How It Started: The consensus of all

available press reports, with no recorded dissent,

indicates that the four sailors voluntarily left

their ship, went AWOL, and ended up wallowing

around Tokyo's hippie-land.

Precisely what

personal grievances prompted the four to embark

on this misadventure is not known.

But, up to

this point, the four could fairly be categorized

as misguided youngsters, gone astray in a foreign

land,

and due to get slapped back in line with

traditional Navy justice. when they finally

decided to stop the fun and go back to the ship.

So far, this made their case far from unique.

(2)

How It Became an Incident: Instead of

returning to their ship of their own volition

or being apprehended by the Shore Patrol, the

four made contact with Beheiren leaders.

Again,

press reports indicate that this was just a

coincidence, that there was no pre-planning by.

the four to contact Beheiren.

There is no

available reporting that indicates otherwise.

But, once the Beheiren people made contact, they

recognized. the potential immediately and moved

fast for the kill.

(3) Beheiren Takes Over: When the four made

contact with Beheiren,

it suddenly became an :

entirely different ball game. Beheiren had

everything needed to capitalize on this:

veteran

activist leaders who are experienced enough to

recognize the windfall that had come their way;

an apparatus that could provide hiding places

for the four; long standing liaison contacts

with Soviet Embassy officials for use in plan-

ning exit from Japan; solid contacts with

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reliable American pacifists with whom the bona

fides of the four sailors could be checked;

money and organization to capitalize on the

propaganda potential (such as preparing a

movie film for the initial Beheiren press con-

ference announcing the desertion, prepared more

likely: than not by Beheiren stalwart KUBO

Keinosuke, an independent film producer); and

English speaking activists capable of sympathiz-

ing, encouraging, soothing, or agitating the

four young sailors, so that there would be na

turning back.

on minor points, are still missing, the follow-

ing elements, all part of the Beheiren apparatus,

make up the bulk of the picture:

(a) Hide-out: When Beheiren got hold of

the four on 26 October, they had to be

hidden out for the approximate two week

period until their exit from Japan could

be arranged.

This presented Beheiren no

great logistical problem.

A number of

the Beheiren activist leaders have homes

well suited to harboring fugitives.

example, Beheiren activist leader FUKASAKU

Mitsusada has a villa hidden away in

Chigasaki, which was used on the night of

12 September for a meeting of about 20 top

Beheiren leaders, and which would be highly

suitable for hiding the four deserters.

Other private dwellings, belonging to

Beheiren leaders and loyal supporters,

scattered throughout both the Kanto (Tokyo)

and Kansai (Osaka, Kobe, Kyoto) areas.

(b)

Beheiren-Soviet Liaison: Beheiren

Secretary General YOSHIKAWA has maintained

periodic contact with Soviet Embassy

officials for years.

Beheiren Chairman

ODA has met Soviet Peace Committee officials

in Moscow.

In the case of the four sailors,

information provided by a reliable sensitive

source has clearly established that both

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YOSHIKAWA and Beheiren American collaborator

Brian Victoria met with Soviet Embassy Chief

Press Attache Nikolay V. Vasilyevich and

First Secretary Sergey D. Anisimov on

30

October.

This meeting was urgently

requested by the Beheiren side, to discuss

"an extremely important, extremely delicate

matter," without doubt the case of the four

sailors.:

(C)

Beheiren-U.S. Pacifist Liaison:

Beheiren

contacted Dartmouth University professor

Ernest P. Young, who flew to Japan on

& November, apparently helped Beheiren

leaders check out the bona fides of the

deserters; and returned to the U.S. on

11 November®

÷(5)

left Japan

on the Soviet passenger ship BAIKAL

on 11 November.

Again, there is no dissenting

opinion, overt or covert. The only mystery

concerning this final phase of the Japanese

portion of this case concerns the mechanics of

how the four boarded the BAIKAL and who assisted

In the maneuver.. But with the sailing of the

BAIKAL from Yokohama,

Beheiren completed its

most highly successful and beautifully executed

activity in its two and one-half year history.

Not:: only did Beheiren smear the United States

Government's image in Japan, gain a vast amount

of priceless publicity that will swell the ranks

of its supporters and be invaluable in future

activities, but Beheiren doubtlessly even made

a profit, financially, on this low budget operation

donations are still pouring into Beheiren head-

quarters from all over Japan to "help and protect

U.S. deserters.".

(6) New Deserters:

The successful flight to

Moscow, through the good offices of Beheiren,

has already stimulated one new would-be defection

case in early December, involving two sailors

from Yokosuka U.S. Navy Base, and prospects are

that more will follow.

Beheiren itself has tried

to keep the "desertion

mood". alive by organizing

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="-

====

a new group to promote and aid defection of

future U.S.

servicemen in Japan.

Beheiren

Chairman ODA is now preparing to depart for

Europe in order to contact and study European

anti-Vietnam War and deserter organizations.

4.

Japanese who have been identified as active Beheiren

supporters or sympathizers:

1:

YOSHIKAWA Yuichi (Beheiren Secretary General) - former

JCP member.

ODA Makoto (Beheiren Chairman) - popular novelist.

RAIKO Ken - Akutagawa prize winning novelist.

KUBO Keinosuke - film producer and director.

TSURUMI Shunsuke - Doshisha University professor.

ISURUMI Kazuko - sister of Shunsuke (their father is the

late philosopher, Yusuke) :

FURUYAMA Yozo - high school teacher.

MUTO Ichiyo - ex-JCP (tried

to travel to U.S. to represent

Beheiren at October 21 demonstrations this year, but

was denied a visa to enter the U.s.).

YAMADA Atsushi - ex-JCP.

FUKUDA Yeshiyuki - playwriter..

TOMINAGA IChire - cartoonist:

FUKASAKU Mitsusada - professor:

AWAZU Kiyoshi - graphic designer.

TAKADO Kaname - Christian leader.

YOSHIDA Kiju - film director.

UMIHARA Shün - writer.

HASHIMOTO Mineo - Buddhist priest.

HOTTA Yoshie - novelist.

GOTO Hiroyuki - scientist.

KUWABARA Takeo - professor at Kyoto University.

SAKAMOTO Yoshikazu - assistant professor at Tokyo University.

RIDAKA Rokuro - professor at Tokyo University.

URU Roshtrike - employed at International House In

Others:

TERAI Minako,

ANAT Fumihiko,

NASU Masanao,

MATSUMOTO Ichiju,

FUKUTOMI Setsuo,

KURIHARA Yukio,

ANDO Jimbei,

KÓBAYASHI Tomi,

KUNQ Osamu (Shu) ,

KURODA Hidetoshi,

MARUYAMA Masao,

MIDORIKAYA. Toru,

MIZUSAWA, Yana,

MORITAKI IchirO,.

YAMANISHI Eiichi,

YASUDA Takeshi;

YOSHINO Genzaburo,

YOSHIWARA Koichiro,

MATSUMOTO Seicho,

EI Rokusuke,

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CHIBA Hido,.

MUCHAKU Seikyo,

EGAWA Taku,

MURAMATSU HirO,

FUJTY Nittatsu,

HARIYU Ichiro,

NISHIO Noboru,

NOMURA Koichi,

HOSHINO YasusaburO,

OGOSHI Teruo,

ICHII Saburo;

OTSUKOTSU Yoshiko,

IKEYAMA Huro;

SERIZAWA Tae,

ISHIDA Takeshi,

SHIRAI Shimpei,

KANAI Yoshiko,

SHINMURA Takeshi,

KASAI Seiichi,

SHISHIDO Hiroshi,

KATAGIRI Yuzuru,

SUGIURA Mitsuo,

KATO Shuichi,

SUGIYAMA Tatsumaru,

KAZANA Michitaro,

SUZUKI Masahira,

MATSUURA SOZO,

TAKEUCHI Yoshitomo,

KOROKORO Masao,

WADA Nagahisa,

KHAKOJ! Satoshi!

YAMADA Munemitsu,

KOBAYASHI ShoiChirO,

YAMADA Toshio,

IZUMI Taku,

AWAYA Noriko,

KATO Yoshiro,

SHIROYAMA Saburo,

TAKAHASHI Taketono,

ODAGIRI Hideo,

ORUMA Minoru,

SANO Kenji,

SUZUKI Michihiko,

RUBATA Hanya,

SHINOHARA Seiei,

MARUYAMA Kunio,

TSURUSHIMA Setsurei,

MURO Kenji,

KONAKA Yotaro,

SAKAMOTO Yoshikazu,

SAITO Masahiko. .

KOMATSU Sakyo,

YAMAGUCHI Kosaku,

5..

Some Beheiren activities and accomplishments:

a ®

Regular once-per-month demonstrations at a public

park in Tokyo, consisting of anti-American speeches

and followed

by street marches.

b.

An all night TV "teach-in" with Beheiren activist

leaders, along with special guest, U.S. pacifist

Carl Oglesby (Chairman of the Students for a

Democratic Society.)

C.

A full page advertisement in the 'New York Times

(16 November 1965), followed by another full page

ad in the Washington Post (3 April 1967), appeal-

ing to Americans to stop the war in Vietnam.

d.

A "Meet in. Conference of Two Nations for Peace in

Vietnam,

pacest be done

¿" held in Tokyo in August 1966, and

attended by. Beheiren activists and seven U.S.

pacifist leaders (including Dave Dellinger),

England, Canada, the

Ussh, Pakistan,,

e

A mass meeting in Tokyo in October 1966,

guest

Speakers of which were French pacifists, Jean-Paul

Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir.

f

Nationwide tours of Japan

for lectures and peace

rallies for such anti-Vietnam war pacifists as

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Professor. Howard Zinn and the late, A.t. Muste

of the United States, Claude Bourdet of France,

and Thich Nhat Hanh of South Vietnam.

A mass meeting in Tokyo in January, 1967, sponsored

• by Beheiren and featuring U.S. folk singer and

pacifist Joan Baez.

h. . A continuing program of direct distribution of

pamphlets to U.S. troops stationed in Japan,

and those coming to Japan on warships, and for

rest or hospitalization from Vietnam.

1.

Participation by two Beheiren activist leaders

(Kyoto University professor KUNABARA Takeo and

International House staffer TSURUMI Yoshikyuki,

taking advantage of a trip to the U.S. to attend

a non-political Japan-America Congress ön

Cultural Problems) in anti-Vietnam War •Speech'

rallies and demonstrations at Dartmouth University

in early May 1967, followed by an unsuccessful

attempt to invite Cassius Clay to visit Japan

on behalf of Beheiren.

Continuing efforts to bring to Japan for

nationwide speech tour on behalf of Beheiren,

Soviet poet Yevgeni Yevtushenko, an effort that

has not yet reached fruition but is still

pending.

k.

Participation in the Stockholm July 1967 "World

‚Conference on Vietnam," by sending two Beheiren

activist leaders as delegates.

1.

Cooperation with the U.S. Quakers, pacifists,

and Earle Reynolds in sending the yacht "Phoenix"

with medical aid, first to Haiphong, then on a

to either North or South Vietnam.

Attempted, but'failed due to inability to obtain

U.S. visa, to send a Beheiren activist leader

(MUTO Ichiyo) to the U.S. to participate in the

21 October 1967 anti-Vietnam War demonstrations.

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Д.

Currently carrying out a fund raising campaign

to send an aid ship to North Vietnam.

• In this,

and other activities, Beheiren leaders ale main-

taining ever closer liaison contact with their

counterparts abroad, such as the French "Comite?"

Vietnam 'National."

In an effort to generate

public support for this aid ship fund raising

campaign, Beheiren succeeded in issuing a public

appeal under the endorsing signatures of Tokyo

Governor MINOBE Ryokichi and Yokohama, Mayor

ASUKATA Ichio, as well as the usual intellectuals

Supporting Beheiren.

0.

In October 1967, Beheiren solicited approval to

hold anti-Vietnam War demonstrations in front

of the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo, expecting to be

denied and then intending to make this denial a

court test case. Instead, Beheiren was given

this permission, and conducted two orderly and

well-publicized

demonstrations in front of the

American Embassy, garnering a larger public turn

out of participants than in any previous Beheiren-

sponsored demonstration.

Assisted and abetted the defection to the USSR

of four, American

carrier INTREPID.

sailors from the U.S. Navy

Following this success,

Beheiren leaders are

"underground railway" of Japanese intellectuals

who will volunteer their homes as possible "way

stops" for hiding

future U.S. military deserters

that Beheiren now hopes

to induce.

Partial listing of American and other foreign persons

known to have been in contact with or cooperated with Beheiren:

Americans

(1) Staughton Lynd: (ex-Yale professor)

(2)

Norman Mailer (novelist)

(3)

Dave Dellinger (Editor of Liberation)

(4)

Howard Zinn (Boston U. professor)

(5)

Donald Keyes (National Committee for a

Sane Nuclear Policy)

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(6)

David NcReynolds (Chairman, War Resisters'

League

(7) As so Muste (now decéased)

(8) ' Karl Meyer

(9)

William Davidson

(10)

Bradford Lyttle

(11). Charlotte Thurber

(12)

(Miss) Quentin Bassett (Students for a

Democratic Society)

(13) Murray Levin (Boston-U. professor)

(14)

Robert Ockene (Veterans and Reservists to

End the War in Vietnam)

(15) Carl Oglesby (Chairman, Students for a

Democratic. Society) (until 1966)

(16)

Barbara Deming (Associate editor of

Liberation)

(17.)

Joan Baez (folk singer)

(18) Ira Morris (Paris expatriate)

(19) Otto Naisan (phonetic, New York City peace

activist)

(20)

Barbara and Earle Reynolds (divorced but

separately active long-time residents in

Japan)

(2]) William R. Christensen (an American pacifist

drifter, who gave Beheiren its first

experience in the summer of 1966 in exploit-

ing for propaganda in Japan, and then in

arranging the onward journey of an American

who wanted to defect to the USSR)

(22)

Brian Victoria (head-shaven pacifist and

"converted" Buddhist priest, known to be in

regular contact with the Soviet Embassy in

Tokyo)

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(23)

Mr.

WIllowby (Inu, phonetic, "chief of the

Quaker Peace Action movement in the U.S.")

(24) ' An unidéntified American of Japanese descent,

from Hawaii, who is currently a student at

Kaseda University

(25)

Kosaku Yamaguchi (reportedly born in U.s.,

present citizenship status unclear--formerly

was a professor at Momoyama University in

Osaka, but has been teaching at the University

of California in Berkeley for some time)

Other Foreigners

(i) Mikhall Kotov, USSR (Soviet Peace Comnittee)*

(3)

Peggy Duff, Great Britain (Campaign for

Nuclear Disarmament)

(1) James Endicott, Canada (World Peace Council)

5? Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Pakistan

(6) Gabita Muslepov, USSR

Mrs. Erdenebat Ojon, Mongolia

(8)

(9)

Konstantin Shugnov, USSR

Francis Marcel Kahn, France (Comite' Vietnam

National)

(to)

Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, France

(1]) Thich Nhat Hanh, South Vietnam

Thistlaca

Thomas H.

Karamessines

Deputy Director for Plans

CSCI-316/00079-68

CC.

Naval Investigative Service

Department of

the Army

Department of State

Federal Bureau of Investigation

Directorate of Special Investigations of the Air Force

Headquarters United States Marine Corps

Defense Intelligence SEcRET

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SECHt!

CSCI-316/00079-68

DDP/FE/JKO/Dianne Schellin:pjm

Distribution:

1 - Each Addressee

1

- C/FE

- FE/ JKO

FE/ JKO/JO

- C/CI

-

CIOP/FE

• CI/LSN

-

• CI/R&A

DD/I

(4 January 1968)

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