After more than 33 years, the State Department on Friday released a message from Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev that was seen as so insulting to President Kennedy that his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, refused to receive it.
The Russian text was obtained recently from Russia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and translated by the department.The Soviet message and Robert Kennedy's memorandum to the president were printed for the first time in a 320-page book, volume six of "Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961-63," a compilation of the complete correspondence between the Soviet and American leaders.
The message from Khrushchev, transmitted through the Soviet Embassy in Washington, was sent on April 1, 1963.
"You now have a lot of these orators, the so-called specialists in military affairs," the message said. "We have to reply, but who stands to gain? The militarists and monopolists making millions on the production of armaments. Only they stand to gain."
Robert Kennedy interpreted the message as saying that the United States was run by capitalists interested only in war profits and that they were dictating U.S. policy.