TOP SECRET URCUASSIFIED b. Agreed that the Chairman, Atomic Energy Comission, should make a brief public announcement on the sub- ject as read and amended at the meeting. NOTE: ident, subsequently trensmitted to fhe Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission. of the MAAG, Saigon. He then asked Under Secretary Hoover to re- port on the follow-up of this Council decision. Secretary Hoover said that the message: in quegtion had been sent that evening to Saigon, as had a message to the Secretary of State in Paris. The Secretary had discussed with Premier Mendes- France the proposed crash program, and had got a delayed|but very violent adverse reaction. ‘The French contended that we Bad violated not only our recent agreements with the French themseliveg in the Conference. There was no proof of any such agreement, s@id Secretary Hoover, but we have certainly not violated the terms Geneva Armistice Agreement as we know those terms. In al we are going ahead with our plans vis-a-vis Diem and Hink Secretary Hoover believed the situation in South Vietnam|now looked @ good deal better. The President inquired whether the French irrifation was simply the result of the fact that we were cutting down @n our cash handouts to them. Secretary Hoover replied that there s¢emed to be more to it than that, and again suggested the possibility of a secret agreement between the French and the Communists at Genevg, in which the British also may have been implicated. Teesao TOT Fe Ngeespay PI waich was oR PIE Tae pre Se ‘oma * . hi, aa’ Tee ataoa ee La nam (NSC Action No. 1250) as set forth in a draft message to be prepared for transmission to the Ambassador and tojthe Chief The President reacted strongly to this latter suggesticn, and said that if there were any question about British ps tion, Secretary Dulles should confront Eden and get the Tlowdown", a to.yee or, if the Secretary preferred, he himself would take thq matter up with Sir Winston Churchill and would do so in his own faghion. re Mr. Cutler reminded the Council of its agreement at its last meeting to inaugurate a crash militery program in South Viet- SPa ery, INDOCHINA (NSC Action No. 1250-4) 7 Ae moot, 2. ‘he action in b above, as approved py the Pres-