by Gary J. Bass
85. White House tapes, Oval Office 635-6, 10 December 1971, 9:10–10:31 a.m.
CHAPTER 19: “I CONSIDER THIS OUR RHINELAND”
1. Government of Pakistan, The Report of the Hamoodur Rehman Commission of Inquiry into the 1971 War (Lahore: Vanguard, 2001), p. 468. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, CIA situation report, 8 December 1971. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, Spivack to Rogers, 8 December 1971, Dacca 5542. NSC Files, Box 643, Country Files—Middle East, India/Pakistan, Nixon-Kissinger telcon, 4 December 1971, 12:15 p.m. See Henry Kissinger, White House Years (Boston: Little, Brown, 1979), p. 896. See also White House tapes, White House telephone 16-37, 7 December 1971, 11:31– 11:54 p.m.
2. NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 235, Manekshaw-Kulikov talks, 24–25 February 1972. Shashi Tharoor, Reasons of State: Political Development and India’s Foreign Policy Under Indira Gandhi, 1966–1977 (New Delhi: Vikas, 1982), pp. 67–68. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, Kissinger to Nixon, 8 December 1971. FRUS, WSAG meeting, 8 December 1971, 11:13 a.m.–12:02 p.m., pp. 690-99. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, sanitized intelligence analysis, n.d. December 1971.
3. FRUS, CIA cable, 7 December 1971, pp. 686–87.
4. A senior aide to Gandhi claims that the mole was later reportedly unveiled as a bitter political rival of Gandhi’s who had been shoved out as deputy prime minister two years earlier (P. N. Dhar, Indira Gandhi, the “Emergency,” and Indian Democracy [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000], p. 181). See Kissinger, White House Years, p. 901. Dhar is referring to the work of the great investigative reporter Seymour Hersh. In The Price of Power: Kissinger in the Nixon White House (New York: Summit, 1983), pp. 449–50, Hersh, relying on U.S. intelligence sources, identified Moraji Desai as the mole, despite Indian and American denials (Josy Joseph, “PV Narasimha Rao Misled Parliament on Help to Writer Seymour Hersh Who Called Moraji Desai a CIA Mole,” Times of India, 8 November 2011). Inder Malhotra, Indira Gandhi: A Personal and Political Biography (London: Hodder & Stoughton 1989), pp. 140–41. Richard Sisson and Leo E. Rose, War and Secession: Pakistan, India, and the Creation of Bangladesh (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990), pp. 140–41, 215, 262. Dhar, Indira Gandhi, the “Emergency,” and Indian Democracy, p. 181. See B. Raman, The Kaoboys of R&AW: Down Memory Lane (New Delhi: Lancer, 2007), p. 21. William Bundy, A Tangled Web: The Making of Foreign Policy in the Nixon Presidency (New York: Hill & Wang, 1998), pp. 285–86, 580n96.
5. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m. See FRUS, WSAG meeting, 9 December 1971, 10:09–11 a.m., pp. 711–21; FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, White House telephone 16-64, 8 December 1971, 8:03–8:12 p.m. This concern with U.S. credibility was a hallmark of Kissinger’s thought, particularly in Vietnam (Garry Wills, Nixon Agonistes: The Crisis of the Self-Made Man [Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1970], pp. 419–20).
6. Hersh, Price of Power, pp. 459–60. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 637-3, 12 December 1971, 8:45–9:42 a.m. For a denial from Gandhi, see R. K. Karanjia and K. A. Abbas, Face to Face with Indira Gandhi (New Delhi: Chetana Publications, 1974), p. 80.
7. A. A. K. Niazi, The Betrayal of East Pakistan (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1998), p. 226. K. P. Candeth, The Western Front: Indo-Pakistan War, 1971 (New Delhi: Allied Publishers, 1984), p. 168. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m.
8. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m. See FRUS, WSAG meeting, 9 December 1971, 10:09–11 a.m., pp. 711–21. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m. The same secretiveness evidently applied to the American public. In his memoirs, Kissinger mentions the White House’s boldness and Nixon’s Bismarck-like courage, but does not mention encouraging Chinese mobilization or the illegal arms shipments. (Kissinger, White House Years, pp. 898–99, 905, 894–918.)
9. Thomas C. Schelling, Arms and Influence (New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1966). NSC Files, Box 643, Country Files—Middle East, India/Pakistan, China memorandum, n.d. December 1971.
10. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 582-9, 30 September 1971, 4:10–5:31 p.m. FRUS, CIA cable, 7 December 1971, pp. 686–87. Patrick E. Tyler, A Great Wall: Six Presidents and China (New York: PublicAffairs, 1999), pp. 71–73.
11. NSA, Huang-Kissinger memcon, 23 November 1971, 10–11:55 p.m. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 630-20, 6 December 1971, 6:14–6:38 p.m. Nixon knew that “those great mountain passes coming down over the Himalaya mountains are all covered with snow.” (White House tapes, White House telephone 16-50, 8 December 1971, 2:15–2:22 p.m.)
12. NSC Files, Box 1025, Presidential/HAK MemCons, Haksar-Kissinger memcon, 7 July 1971, 1:10 p.m. See NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 169, Haksar minutes of Kissinger meeting, 6 July 1971. NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 225, Gandhi-Kissinger conversation, 7 July 1971. MEA, WII/121/54/71, Kissinger-Ram meeting, 7 July 1971 (attached to Menon to Singh, 13 July 1971). NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 229, Kissinger-Ram meeting, 7 July 1971. MEA, WII/121/54/71, “Salient Points Mentioned by Dr. Kissinger,” n.d. July 1971. In late August, Kissinger had retreated somewhat from this pledge, but still said that if Pakistan brazenly attacked India, and China backed up Pakistan, then the United States would “give all-out help to India against China.” (MEA, WII/121/54/71, Jha to Kaul, 27 August 1971.) In addition, India had some shopworn pledges from the Kennedy administration. U.S. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1961–1963: South Asia, ed. Louis J. Smith (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1996), vol. 19, Galbraith to Nehru, 9 July 1963, document 307. See NSC Files, Box H-058, SRG Meetings, Saunders and Kennedy to Kissinger, 21 July 1971.
13. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, Kissinger to Nixon, 7 December 1971. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, CIA intelligence memorandum, “China’s Military Options and Capabilities Against India’s Border Areas,” 7 December 1971. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, Kissinger to Nixon, 8 December 1971 (for an unredacted version, see FRUS, pp. 688-89). See NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, DIA intelligence appraisal, 9 December 1971.
14. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m.
15. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, White House telephone 16-64, 8 December 1971, 8:03–8:12 p.m.
16. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 637-3, 12 December 1971, 8:45–9:42 a.m.
17. NSC Files, Box H-084, WSAG Meetings, Kennedy and Saunders to Kissinger, 16 December 1971. FRUS, Farland to Kissinger, 4 December 1971, p. 610. NSC Files, Box 643, Country Files—Middle East, India/Pakistan, Nixon-Kissinger telcon, 4 December 1971, 10:50 a.m. NSC Files, Box 643, Country Files—Middle East, India/Pakistan, Nixon-Kissinger telcon, 4 December 1971, 12:15 p.m. The transcript says “paralized.” See NSC Files, Box 571, Indo-Pak War, Heck to Rogers, 5 December 1971, Tehran 6850. On Iran’s support for Pakistan, see MEA, HI/1012/30/71, Chib to Kaul, 10 November 1971; NMML, Kaul Papers, Subject File 19, Singh briefing in London, n.d. June 1971; MEA, WII/125/59/71, “Note for Supplementaries,” n.d. July 1971; POL 23-9 PAK, Box 2530, Farland to Rogers, 1 April 1971, Islamabad 3016; POL 23-9 PAK, Box 2531, MacArthur to Rogers, 15 April 1971, Tehran 1946. See Roham Alvandi, “Nixon, Kissinger, and the Shah,” Diplomatic History, vol. 36, no. 2 (2012), pp. 337–72.
18. NSA, Kissinger-Afshar telcon, 4 December 1971. See NSA, Kissinger-Raza telcon, 6 December 1971, 1:24 p.m. The U.S. embassy in Tehran seems to have been in the dark (NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, Heck to Rogers, 8 December 1971, Tehran 6924). NSA, Nixon-Kissinger telcon, 4 December 1971. See NSC Files, Box H-084, WSAG Meetings, Kennedy and Saunders to Kissinger, 16 December 1971.
19. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m. NSA, Johnson to Brown, 9 December 1971, State 221847. NSC Files, Box 573, Indo-Pak War, Rogers to Brown, 9 December 1971, State 221847. FRUS, p. 610. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 19
71, 4:20–5:01 p.m. See John Fricker and Paul Jackson, “Lockheed F-104 Starfighter,” Wings of Fame (London: Aerospace Publishing, 1996), vol. 2, pp. 38–99. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m. See NSC Files, Box H-083, WSAG Meetings, Saunders and Kennedy to Kissinger, “WSAG Meeting—South Asia,” 6 December 1971; and NSC Files, Box H-083, WSAG Meetings, Sisco to Brown, “Pakistan Request for Jordanian Military Assistance,” draft cable, 12 May 1971.
20. FRUS, WSAG meeting, 6 December 1971, 11:07–11:56 a.m., pp. 656–67.
21. White House tapes, Oval Office 630-2, 6 December 1971, 12:02–12:06 p.m.
22. Back in July, John Dean, the White House counsel, had written that he had “cause for concern that such shipments be above legal question.” (NSC Files, Box 626, Country Files—Middle East, Pakistan, vol. VI, Dean to Haig, 12 July 1971. See NSC Files, Box 626, Country Files—Middle East, Pakistan, vol. VI, Hoskinson to Haig, 18 August 1971.) NSC Files, Box 574, Indo-Pak War, South Asian Military Supply, Haig to Nixon, 25 June 1971. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 635-8, 10 December 1971, 10:51– 11:12 a.m. The crucial legal memorandum is NSC Files, Box H-083, WSAG Meetings, Eliot to Kissinger, 7 December 1971; NSC Files, Box H-084, WSAG Meetings, Eliot to Kissinger, 7 December 1971. The State Department cited the Foreign Military Assistance Act of 1961 and the 1971 amendment to the Foreign Military Sales Act. See NSC Files, Box H-083, WSAG Meetings, Sisco to Brown, “Pakistan Request for Jordanian Military Assistance,” draft cable, 12 May 1971.
23. NSC Files, Box H-083, WSAG Meetings, Defense Department memorandum, 7 December 1971; NSC Files, Box H-084, WSAG Meetings, Defense Department memorandum, 7 December 1971. See NSC Files, Box H-083, WSAG Meetings, Saunders and Kennedy to Kissinger, “WSAG Meeting—South Asia,” 8 December 1971. See NSC Files, Box H-084, WSAG Meetings, Packard to Kissinger, 7 December 1971.
24. NSC Files, Box H-083, WSAG Meetings, Saunders and Kennedy to Kissinger, “WSAG Meeting—South Asia,” 6 December 1971. See NSC Files, Box 575, Indo-Pak War, Saunders to Kissinger, “Jordanian Transfer of F-104s to Pakistan,” 7 December 1971. NSC Files, Box H-084, WSAG Meetings, Saunders to Kissinger, “Military Supply for Pakistan,” 9 December 1971. NSC Files, Box H-083, WSAG Meetings, Saunders and Kennedy to Kissinger, “WSAG Meeting—South Asia,” 6 December 1971. See NSC Files, Box H-083, WSAG Meetings, Saunders to Kissinger, “WSAG Meeting—South Asia,” 9 December 1971. Richard Reeves, President Nixon: Alone in the White House (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2007), p. 400.
25. White House tapes, Oval Office 631-3, 7 December 1971, 3:04–3:11 p.m.
26. FRUS, WSAG meeting, 8 December 1971, 11:13 a.m.–12:02 p.m., pp. 690–99.
27. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m. The Indian government suspected that Iran was sending U.S. airplanes to Pakistan, and complained to Keating about it (MEA, WII/109/31/71, vol. I, Kaul to Jha, 6 December 1971). FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, White House telephone 16-64, 8 December 1971, 8:03–8:12 p.m.
28. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m. NSA, Kissinger-Raza telcon, 8 December 1971, 2:47 p.m. NSA, Kissinger-Raza telcon, 8 December 1971, 7:10 p.m. Still, Nixon wanted India to see the menacing hand of the United States: “I’d like to make sure that the Indians know we are behind it one way or another.” (FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m.)
29. NSC Files, Box H-084, WSAG Meetings, Kennedy and Saunders to Kissinger, 16 December 1971. NSC Files, Box 643, Country Files—Middle East, India-Pakistan, Haig to Kissinger, 19 January 1972.
30. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, EOB 307-27, 8 December 1971, 4:20–5:01 p.m.
31. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 633-11, 9 December 1971, 12:44–1:27 p.m. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 634-19, 9 December 1971, 5:57–6:34 p.m.
32. NSA, Kissinger-Connally telcon, 6 December 1971, 11:10 p.m. White House tapes, White House telephone 16-64, 8 December 1971, 8:03–8:12 p.m. See NSC Files, Box 134, Kissinger Office Files, Country Files—Middle East, Nixon to Brezhnev, 6 December 1971; NSC Files, Box 134, Kissinger Office Files, Country Files—Middle East, Brezhnev to Nixon, 8 December 1971. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 634-12, 9 December 1971, 4–4:41 p.m. See NSC Files, Box 134, Kissinger Office Files, Country Files—Middle East, Nixon to Brezhnev, 6 December 1971, Nixon-Matskevich memcon, 9 December 1971, 4 p.m.; H. R. Haldeman, The Haldeman Diaries: Inside the Nixon White House (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1994), 9 December 1971, p. 381; Kissinger, White House Years, p. 904.
33. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 634-12, 9 December 1971, 4–4:41 p.m. See Haldeman, Haldeman Diaries, 9 December 1971, p. 381.
34. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 635-17, 10 December 1971, 12:47–1:01 p.m. FRUS, Nixon to Brezhnev, 10 December 1971, pp. 746–47.
35. NSA, Kissinger-Vorontsov telcon, 11 December 1971, after 7:30 p.m. NSA, Nixon-Kissinger telcon, 11 December 1971, 7:30 p.m.
36. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 635-8, 10 December 1971, 10:51–11:12 a.m. Kissinger’s figures on Jordanian planes are from FRUS, Haig to Kissinger, 10 December 1971, p. 750. See also White House tapes, Oval Office 635-6, 10 December 1971, 9:10–10:31 a.m.; White House tapes, Oval Office 636-8, 10 December 1971, 4:18–5:11 p.m.
37. FRUS, WSAG meeting, 9 December 1971, 10:09–11 a.m., pp. 711-21. NSC Files, Box H-084, WSAG Meetings, Kennedy and Saunders to Kissinger, 16 December 1971.
38. NSC Files, Box 573, Indo-Pak War, State Department situation report, 16 December 1971. NSC Files, Box 573, Indo-Pak War, State Department situation report, 14 December 1971.
39. U.S. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States: China, 1969–1972, ed. Stephen E. Phillips (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 2006), vol. 17, Huang-Haig meeting, 12 December 1971, 3:50–4:20 p.m., pp. 621–24. NSA, unsigned note for Walters to hand to the Chinese, 17 December 1971. NSC Files, Box 643, Country Files—Middle East, India-Pakistan, Nixon-Kissinger telcon, 16 December 1971, 9:30 a.m. See Jesse W. Lewis Jr., “Jordan Sent Jets to Pakistan Despite Ban, U.S. Confirms,” Washington Post, 19 April 1972, p. A14.
40. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 635-8, 10 December 1971, 10:51–11:12 a.m. See FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 635-17, 10 December 1971, 12:47–1:01 p.m.
41. NSA, Bush notes, 10 December 1971. NSA, Huang-Kissinger memcon, 10 December 1971, 6:05–7:55 p.m. Kissinger, White House Years, pp. 906, 889.
42. NSA, Huang-Kissinger memcon, 10 December 1971, 6:05–7:55 p.m. NSA, Bush notes, 10 December 1971.
43. NSA, Nixon-Kissinger telcon, 11 December 1971, 3 p.m. For a U.S. intelligence analysis saying that China was not moving, see NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, DIA intelligence appraisal, 9 December 1971. NSA, Nixon-Kissinger telcon, 11 December 1971, 7:30 p.m. See NSA, Kissinger-Bhutto-Raza telcon, 11 December 1971, 7:28 p.m. On Bhutto’s appointment, see NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, Farland to Rogers, 7 December 1971, Islamabad 11174.
44. NSA, Bush notes, 10 December 1971.
45. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 634-19, 9 December 1971, 5:57–6:34 p.m. FRUS, vol. E-7, White House tapes, Oval Office 635-8, 10 December 1971, 10:51–11:12 a.m. See NSA, Kissinger-Laird telcon, 11 December 1971, 3:35 p.m. See also NSA, Kissinger-Irwin telcon, 10 December 1971, 9 a.m.; FRUS, WSAG meeting, 10 December 1971, 9:45–10:17 a.m., pp. 735–39.
46. Robert Jackson, South Asian Crisis: India, Pakistan and Bangla Desh: A Political and Historical Analysis of the 1971 War (New York: Praeger, 1975), p. 141. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, Farland to Rogers, 8 December 1971, Islamabad 12215. NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 174, Farman Ali to Henry, 10 December 1971. NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 174, Henry to Thant, 10 December 1971. NSC Files, Box 134, Kissinger Office Files, Country Files—Middle East, Spivack to Rogers, 10 December 1971, Dacca 5573. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak W
ar, State Department situation report, 10 December 1971. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, State Department situation report, 10 December 1971. Hamoodur Rehman Commission Report, pp. 256–57, 143–44. NSC Files, Box 572, Indo-Pak War, Bush to Rogers, 11 December 1971, USUN 4935. For Niazi’s claims that he could have held out, see his Betrayal of East Pakistan, pp. 174–95. NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 174, Haksar to Dutt, 13 December 1971.
47. Hamoodur Rehman Commission Report, p. 475.
48. NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 173, “A note on India’s objectives in the current conflict with Pakistan,” 9 December 1971. For Haksar’s anxiety, see NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 173, Haksar to Gandhi, 11 December 1971; NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 173, Haksar to Singh, 11 December 1971. NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 173, Haksar to ambassadors, 10 December 1971. NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 173, Gandhi to heads of state, 10 December 1971.
49. NMML, Haksar Papers, Subject File 173, “A note on India’s objectives in the current conflict with Pakistan,” 9 December 1971.