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After Mr. Hughes completes his review, I will summarize very briefly our current estimates
of the Soviet military strength in Cuba.
Mr. Hughes.
I began my briefing.
EDITOR’S NOTE
At the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, I was a 20-year-old college senior anticipating
my future as an Army officer, fully expecting that the immediate future might include a
tour of duty in Cuba. I would watch John Hughes’ briefing that night on national television,
and would marvel at the photographic evidence being revealed to the nation. Twenty
years later, I would be assigned to the Pentagon office of John T. Hughes, then the Deputy
Director for External Affairs of the Defense Intelligence Agency, as Hughes’ Executive
Officer, responsible for overseeing the myriad operational and administrative details
swirling about this man and his office.
Eight months into my tour, President Ronald Reagan chose John Hughes to give
another special presentation to the nation — this time on another hot-spot: Nicaragua.
With déjà vu apparent, the site for the briefing was to be the State Department Auditorium
with the giant screen, and again, Hughes would need a long pointer to reach every part of
the enormous projected images. This time it was his Deputy, Colonel Al Jones, who
pulled from his desk a sectional bamboo fishing pole, which Hughes assembled on-site
for the briefing. If one looks closely at the pictures of John Hughes that appeared on the
front pages of the New York Times and the Washington Post that Wednesday, 10 March
1982, one can make out the ridges separating the sections of the bamboo fishing pointer.
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