◆ SpookStack

..J:QP 3f::CR"ET with the approval of the President's comprehensive program of covert action against Fidel Castro in March 1960. 105/ The difficulties encountered with the Department of Defense concerning the 'assignment of Special Force trainers from the US Army to the Guatemalan training bases has already been spelled out in considerable detail in another volume, but even as the Department of Defense was taking a negative attitude toward the possible use of DOD personnel in either training or combat activities, the Agency was proposing the re- ....• cruitment of either American or foreign volunteers to serve as combat troops for Project JMATE., The Bureau of American Republic Affairs of Department of State, however, put the quietus on the plan for obtaining foreign volunteers; but J. Foster Collins, - , the Chief of the Covert Action Staff, suggested to \ the Deputy Director for Plans that possibly he (the DDP) could convince Livingston Merchant of the need to re-examine the Department of State policy.* * The problem of the Special Force trainers is dis- cussed in Volume II of this history, Participation in the Conduct of Foreign Policy. - 118 - -TAP Q ... on r-r