Years of Upheaval

by Henry Kissinger

  But on October 10, whatever our perception of the resupply problem, we had to delay the diplomacy until there was a change on the war front. We thought the optimum military circumstance for the postwar diplomacy we were planning was if Israel could restore the prewar situation or perhaps go slightly beyond it. This would demonstrate that the military option backed by Soviet arms was an illusion; that diplomatic progress depended on American support. Failing that, it might be possible to negotiate on the basis of an Israeli military advance on one front, even with a setback on the other — though this would be a much more complicated state of affairs.

  On October 10, however, neither of these conditions yet existed. Israel had barely recaptured the Golan except for some Syrian outposts in the Mount Hermon area. Two Egyptian armies were firmly established across the Suez Canal. There was no prospect of an offensive in the Sinai; the only Israeli option was an offensive against Syria scheduled for the next morning. We would stall the Soviet overture until the results of this operation became clearer. (It must be remembered we had been told that very day that Egypt was not yet ready to give up its demand for total withdrawal. And we had heard nothing from Syria.)

  To gain time, I told Dobrynin at 5:40 P.M. on October 10 that we had not had the time to consider his proposal for joint abstention from a simple cease-fire proposal. I would be in touch later. I added soothingly that we took the idea of a cease-fire seriously even if the mechanics were complicated. This was thin gruel but it prevented acrimony. That evening, Kurt Waldheim called to say that there was no majority in the Security Council for any resolution and that only Peru, Kenya, and Guinea were inscribed as speakers for the next day. Neither the Arabs nor Israel seemed to want any kind of cease-fire. This suited us fine. But Waldheim was worried: “More and more people are asking me, what is the [Secretary-General] doing to stop the fighting” — a fair enough question considering that nearly a week of a major war had passed without any formal UN action whatever.

  At 9:45 P.M., I called Dobrynin again: “Anatoly, we won’t be able to give you an answer till tomorrow.” Dobrynin, who understood very well what I was doing, responded with affable menace: “You are playing quite well. Don’t overplay the theme of Russian irresponsibility.” I warned him again about the “massive” Soviet airlift.

  Late in the day of October 10 we received another message, through Beirut, from an unexpected source: Yasir Arafat, head of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). It is difficult to remember now the relatively marginal role played by the PLO until after the October war. In 1967 the hallowed UN Security Council Resolution 242 had made no reference to the PLO; it mentioned the Palestinians only as refugees. In “Black September” of 1970, King Hussein had uprooted the PLO from Jordan, inviting a crisis with Syria, whose backing of the PLO stemmed more from long-held designs on Jordan than political affinity with Palestinians. Until well into 1974, the common assumption was that Jordan, not the PLO, would negotiate with Israel over the West Bank. We had no political contact with Arafat. Occasionally, inconsequential messages were exchanged through low-level channels. Arafat’s message now declared that it was

  99 percent sure that the Israelis will rout the Egyptian and Syrians in the next few days. The United States therefore should not intervene or provide any more aid to Israel until after hostilities. The United States should seek a cease-fire soonest without preconditions.

  This suggested that the Arabs, having crossed the prewar lines by their own efforts, had regained enough “face” to undertake real negotiations, even if they eventually would lose the battle, as Arafat seemed to predict. According to Arafat, the PLO was willing to participate in these talks though it reserved the right to settle its old score of 1970 with Jordan. This could mean, if taken at face value, that the PLO might conceivably make peace with Israel though never with Jordan. Arafat promised no hostile actions against American personnel or installations — unless America undertook a resupply effort while the war was going on. Did Arafat really believe this assessment and seek an entry into the negotiations? Or was he playing the same game as everybody else, trying to stall — in that case, prevent our resupply effort — in order to accelerate a victory of his allies? It made no real difference, for we did not return a reply until the war was over (see Chapter XIII).

  That evening I reviewed the day’s events and our progress. We would maintain contact with the parties. Our aim was to slow down diplomacy without appearing obstructionist, to urge a speedup of military operations without seeming to intervene, and then to force a cease-fire before the impatience and frustration of the parties or unforeseeable events could rip the whole finely spun fabric to smithereens.

  October 11: Israel Drives into Syria

  THE next day, Thursday, October n, it became apparent that Dobrynin had not threatened idly. Ten new Soviet flights to Syria were detected in the early hours; indeed, the Soviet airlift now included flights to Egypt and even Iraq. Later in the day we learned that three Soviet airborne divisions had been put on alert.

  That morning Israel’s strategy also became clear. Israel was sweeping across the prewar lines on the Syrian front and carrying the air war deep into Syria. Defense Minister Moshe Dayan was quoted by news tickers as saying that the Israeli army was heading for Damascus. By the end of the day, Israel occupied a salient on the Golan Heights eleven kilometers deep and twelve kilometers wide, beyond the prewar lines. Forward Israeli positions were only about thirty-five kilometers (or twenty miles) from Damascus. This Israeli gain accorded with our preferred strategy if only the Israelis had kept quiet about it. After all, we had been stalling the Soviets for over twenty-four hours on a cease-fire in place — a position we could hardly maintain if Israel announced that it was advancing on the capital of a Soviet ally. I put the problem to Shalev around 11:00 A.M.:

  It is not very good for you on the one hand to ask me to slow down the UN and you get Dayan to say on the radio and TV that you are heading for Damascus. How can we get the UN to slow down when you make this kind of announcement by your Defense Minister? . . . This looks like the most extreme form of collusion and bad faith.

  But I continued to stall with Dobrynin, this time using the excuse that we needed to consult with Israel and other parties before a meaningful cease-fire proposal could be put forward. In fact, I was in urgent consultation with Israel, though not about a cease-fire. But this time there were increasing public complaints, led by Senator Henry Jackson and some columnists, that we were procrastinating in resupplying Israel and that détente was being exploited by the Soviets to lull us. The latter charge was especially ironic since, as we saw it, we were seeking to calm Moscow via détente to restore the situation. And it was highly unfair. Haig, Scowcroft, Sisco, and I were making strenuous efforts to assure resupply. We were trying to find our way through the unfamiliar world of air charters; and we were working on the assumption, encouraged by the Israelis, that by the time the supplies got through, the war on the Syrian front would be won. We were also doing our best to protect Israel from other attack: Tempers became so frayed that Nixon asked me to warn Dinitz he would hold Dinitz personally responsible if the hostile news stories continued — one of the emptiest threats imaginable.

  The Golan Front: Israeli Counterattack

  Late on October 11, British Prime Minister Edward Heath called me about the ever-mounting pressure on King Hussein to do something on behalf of his Arab brethren. Hussein was thinking of moving an armored brigade into Syria, as much out of harm’s way as he could manage. He wanted Israel’s acquiescence if possible; at the very least he sought an assurance that Israel would not use it as a pretext for an attack into Jordan.

  Only in the Middle East is it conceivable that a belligerent would ask its adversary’s approval for engaging in an act of war against it. “This,” quipped Dinitz when I later submitted the proposition to him, was how “to fight war with all of the conveniences.” Predictably, the Israeli response a day later was to say no. One could not expect a
nation fighting for survival formally to agree to the reinforcement of its enemies; but the Israeli reply made no threat of retaliation or of expanding the war. Israel’s message had crossed with one from Hussein telling me what I already knew: the forty-eight-hour delay for which I had asked on Wednesday was up; Jordan had to make the least provocative move, which was to send a brigade to Syria. The purpose was to counterbalance “Iraqi-Soviet designs” and to contain the disaster within “the minimum possible area.” I sent him a reply urging that he continue his efforts to circumscribe the area and scale of the conflict. We all faced a very difficult situation, but I had no doubt that with steady nerves, wisdom, and courage we could yet bring some good out of the disaster that had again struck the Middle East. I told him I had urged restraint on the Israelis, and it was therefore equally important for his forces to act with circumspection.

  On the night of the eleventh, I received another message from Hafiz Ismail, this one pleading that we restrain Israel from bombing Egyptian civilian targets in the Nile delta; more than five hundred Egyptians had allegedly been killed or wounded there. When I replied next day that we would urge Israel to desist from attacks on purely civilian targets, I used the occasion to make two other points. Under the pretext of commenting on phony Egyptian press reports that American combat forces were engaged in the war, I warned against permitting Soviet military participation. Such an action was certain to involve us directly and in opposition to Egypt. And I once more reminded Sadat through Ismail of what he had — unknown to me — already concluded, that Egypt would need the United States if there were to be successful postwar negotiations:

  No United States forces are involved in military operations. No United States forces will be involved in any way unless other powers intervene from outside the area with direct military action. . . . The United States stands ready to consider any Egyptian proposal for ending hostilities with understanding and good will. It will attempt to be helpful when hostilities are ended. Whatever the inevitable pressures of the moment, the U.S. hopes that both sides will not lose sight of this objective.

  October 12–13: Our Airlift Begins

  AT the end of the first week, with even the Golan Heights battle undecided and a cease-fire proposal seemingly almost on the table, it was clear the Soviet-American relationship was becoming a case history of both the possibilities and the limitations of détente. The Soviets were certainly giving vocal support to their Arab friends. Their airlift was disturbing. And now we learned that seven, not just three, Soviet airborne divisions were on alert. But this support was as yet far short of what the Soviets were capable of doing. After the war, all Arab leaders complained to me that the Soviet airlift was grudging and the sealift was slow, as if to rub in the Arabs’ dependency. And the Soviet Union never launched a diplomatic offensive to embarrass or isolate us at the United Nations. I do not believe that history will judge that we were the party being used. The war was contained, and the United States maneuvered successfully to reduce the Soviet role in the Middle East.

  This perception of East-West relations is fundamental to an understanding of my first news conference during the war, on Friday, October 12. My remarks were the subject of criticism because I refused to bury détente even while warning the Soviets that they were approaching its outer limits. But a verbal assault on Moscow would have accelerated events when it was our purpose to slow them down; it could have forced a confrontation while the military situation did not yet favor our strategy. That is why I spoke in carefully measured terms:

  We did not consider the Soviet statement to the President of Algeria helpful. We did not consider the airlift of military equipment helpful. We also do not consider that Soviet actions as of now constitute the irresponsibility that on Monday evening I pointed out would threaten détente. When that point is reached, we will in this crisis, as we have in other crises, not hesitate to take a firm stand. But at this moment we are still attempting to moderate the conflict. As of this moment we have to weigh against the actions of which we disapprove — and quite strongly — the relative restraint that has been shown in public media in the Soviet Union and in the conduct of their representatives at the Security Council.

  With respect to the Soviet airlift I employed the same combination of menace mitigated by restraint:

  The Soviet airlift, at this moment, is moderate. It’s more than light. It’s a fairly substantial airlift. And it has to be addressed in relation to the possibility of influencing immediate military operations.

  As far as we are concerned, you all know that we do have an ongoing military relationship with Israel, which we are continuing. And we are having discussions with Israel about the special situation created by recent events. . . .

  A journalist asked whether Arab threats to cut off our oil supplies would affect our decision to resupply Israel. I replied:

  We have made a very serious effort, in this crisis, to take seriously into account Arab concerns and Arab views. On the other hand, we have to pursue what we consider to be the right course; we will take the consequences. . . .

  Asked whether the United States was prepared to be as firm now as in the Jordan crisis of 1970, I replied with a thinly veiled warning: “Situations are never comparable, but the basic principles that governed our policies throughout this administration remain constant. . . .” And I summed up publicly the strategy I had been articulating to my colleagues privately:

  We have not gratuitously sought opportunities for confrontations in public forums which might harden dividing lines and which might make it more difficult to move toward a settlement. . . . Our objective is to bring about an end of hostilities in such a manner that we will be in contact with all of the parties, as well as with the permanent members of the Security Council, after hostilities are ended, because we believe that in this manner we can make a maximum contribution to a just and lasting peace in the Middle East.

  I spoke to Nixon on that Friday morning at the end of the first week. He was preoccupied with selecting a new Vice President, the first time a President in office was able to appoint his own successor. I told him where we stood with respect to the air charters and our stalling on the Soviet cease-fire proposal, now forty-eight hours old.

  Dobrynin, meanwhile, was getting restless. At a testy lunch he brought an unsigned note to express the “surprise” of his leadership at my complaint about Soviet public statements supporting the Arabs. Were we not making many statements in support of Israel? (His question was not without merit, though sidestepping the issue of who had opened hostilities.) The note also objected to the eastward deployment of our Sixth Fleet, which was now milling around near Crete with the Soviet fleet. This was basically low-order griping, designed to show that the Soviets were getting impatient. Dobrynin stiffened when I mentioned the alerting of Soviet airborne divisions. Nothing irritates Soviet officials more than evidence of our intelligence capabilities — particularly diplomats if they are not being kept informed of military deployments. Dobrynin rather heatedly emphasized that the Soviet Union could not be indifferent to threats to Damascus. If Israel continued its advance, matters might get out of hand. I warned that any Soviet military intervention would be resisted and wreck the entire fabric of US–Soviet relations.

  Israel had informed us before my press conference that it was now agreeable to proceeding with a standstill cease-fire. I could have acted on that assurance, but to make sure nothing would get unstuck I had inquired whether there was any recommendation on timing. At 3:15 P.M. Shalev replied that Israel would prefer — but did not insist — that the resolution not be put to a vote until the afternoon of the following day, Saturday. However, we could start the process of consultation at our discretion. At 5:50 P.M. I told Eban in New York that we would aim for a vote not before late the next afternoon. To concert tactics we scheduled a meeting for 9:00 A.M. the next morning, Saturday, October 13 — the eighth day of the war — in Washington. At 6:50 P.M. I contacted the British Ambassador, Lord Cromer, to pro
pose that Britain introduce a cease-fire in place at the Security Council the next day. Cromer thought it a good idea, but was obviously without instructions. We would have to wait to see what Prime Minister Heath and Foreign Secretary Sir Alec Douglas-Home thought.

  Then at 7:00 P.M. the Soviet Minister, Yuli Vorontsov, requested an immediate appointment for Dobrynin, who was said to have an “urgent” message to deliver to me. Since Nixon was going to announce his choice for Vice President at 9:00 P.M., I would have to be at the White House at 8:30. (Haig had told me in the afternoon that Gerald Ford was the choice.) I could see Dobrynin for fifteen minutes at the State Department at 8:00 P.M.

  At 7:45 P.M. I warned Dinitz of the coming Soviet message. He told me that Israel was very concerned about the implied Soviet threats conveyed to me over lunch by Dobrynin. Golda had authorized him to tell me to submit the cease-fire resolution that evening if I thought it wise. I demurred. No one would be ready to proceed on such short notice; any sudden show of American anxiety would invite new pressures. More important, I said, “once you have been threatened it is better to stick to your course.”

  It was a rule I sought to follow whenever possible. A leader known to yield to intimidation invites it. A statesman with a reputation for intransigence in the face of menace does not avoid all pressures but he reduces them to those that adversaries consider unavoidable. No leader can skirt all confrontations, but if he maneuvers carefully and with determination he can avoid provoking them by either excessive bellicosity or excessive pliability.

  Things were clearly getting tense. Either the Soviets sensed an imminent victory or they feared the approaching demoralization of their clients. The first threatening public statement from Moscow preceded Dobrynin into my office. TASS, the Soviet news agency, attacked the “criminal actions of the Israeli military” in bombing civilian targets in Syria and Egypt, which they said had resulted in some Soviet casualties. The Soviet Union, said TASS, could not regard these actions “indifferently.” When Dobrynin arrived in bubbling good cheer, he had with him not one but two messages on the same theme. The first assailed the “barbaric bombings by the Israeli aviation of peaceful population centers in Egypt and Syria, Damascus includ[ed] . . .” It added ominously that Israeli population centers would not remain immune indefinitely. That message also sharply protested an attack by Israeli torpedo boats on a Soviet merchant ship in a Syrian harbor, culminating in another threat: “The Soviet Union will of course take measures which it will deem necessary to defend its ships and other means of transportation.”