 I just wanted to bring you up to date on the Belgian operation on the Congo. It came off as I think you're aware at 11 o'clock last night, eastern standard time, when 545 Belgians were dropped, no casualties from fire. During the drop, two to three soldiers were injured, broken ankles and things of that kind. 12 USC-130s participated, four were hit by ground fire. One sustained major damage in a fuel tank, all however landed safely at Leopoldville. No U.S. casualties in the aircraft at all. The aircraft was secured, the airfield was secured in about half an hour, which was excellent under the circumstances. The city was entered in about 45 minutes after the start of the drop. The European hostages had been rounded up by the rebels into two groups. One group was out near the airport, the other was in effect in the square of the city. There were 60 to 75 U.S. personnel in a hotel and we think that of these as many as 15, let me start again, there were 60 to 75 personnel including some U.S., mostly Belgians however, in a hotel and of the 60 to 75, 15 were killed by the rebels. Shooting indiscriminately into the mob, 30 were wounded. There were about 250 European civilians hurted into a square. Rebels fired into those, about 15 were killed and 40 wounded. So it looks as though something on the order of 30 hostages were killed and maybe 70 wounded. Our console, the man named White, HOIT, is reported well and has been evacuated, we believe. Dr. Carlson, the missionary we believe is dead. The Van der Waal column, which was the column led by mercenaries, entered the city about five hours after the drop started and linked up with the Belgian paratroopers and the Van der Waal column captured the camp Cotili which was on the eastern side of the city and was the center of the rebel flower area where the other hostages had been reported. Our C-130s have been running missions between Stanleyville and Leopoldville evacuating the refugees. About 200 to 300 have already been taken out and about 500 more remain to be taken out. We think we'll take out about half with C-130s and the other half with commercial aircraft. So far it's been, I should say, militarily a highly successful operation but the casualties to the hostages have been heavy. How many Americans do you anticipate? We don't really know. As you know, we thought there were about 25 American hostages there with some 600 Belgian hostages. And we don't know that any Americans were either killed or wounded but my guess is that there must have been some other than Carlson as I mentioned who we believe is dead. What do they do just to make him pay the price? We don't have the exact details of his death here. We don't know whether he was killed ahead of time or during the episode I believe it was ahead of time but I'm not absolutely positive about it. Any rebels killed? I'm sure there were but we don't have reports of that either. Who would kill him? Paratrooper? The Belgian paratrooper, yes. And the Bandeval column coming in from the other side. What's the reaction in our country? You're really the same, Mr. President. It missed most of the morning papers but the late morning Washington Post has an article on the front page and the headline is U.S. drops rescuers in Congo. The article is straightforward but appears entirely sensible. What are the potential dangers you see in this action? The danger is that there are several bulls one we can be accused of colonialism linking up with a reactionary government in the Congo and indiscriminately killing the rebel people who we believe will be supported by the Eight Nations African Conference. It looks almost certain as though Kenyatta and the government of seven other African states will be supporting the rebels and therefore attacking us for supporting the government. I doubt, however, that in view of the rebel action in indiscriminately killing the hostages there will be any strong public support in this country for that charge. I think we would have been in a worse position if we'd gone ahead and withheld the drop and then had the Vanderbalk column approach the city and the rebels would have acted, I suspect, almost exactly the same fashion except they would have had more time and killed more hostages. And then you would have been charged with withholding military assistance which was closed at hand and as a result accepting a large number of civilians death.