Years of Upheaval

by Henry Kissinger

  And all this time he suffered from phlebitis. He was often in great pain — a fact none of his close associates was at first aware of. In truth, when he overruled his doctors by going, he risked serious danger to his life if the blood clot in the veins of his leg broke loose and traveled toward the heart.

  For a few days the anguish was submerged in the exuberant joy of our reception in Cairo. We arrived on Wednesday, June 12. From the moment Nixon stepped on Egyptian soil, it was apparent that all had been designed to hail his role as the key factor in the peace process. Having been spoiled as the recipient of abundant flattery and attention on previous trips, I found it — not to my credit — somewhat disconcerting, even painful, to be relegated to what in the context of a Presidential trip was quite properly a subsidiary role. The press, freed from previous restraints by my Salzburg press conference, gleefully reported both the fact that I received “little attention” and that I seemed “glum.” As for Nixon, he was uplifted by Sadat’s welcoming remarks, which paid tribute to America’s central contribution “under the leadership of President Nixon” in promoting peace.

  The words were cordial enough but they paled before Nixon’s triumphal progress from Cairo Airport to his residence at Qubbah Palace. Perhaps a million cheering Egyptians lined the street as Nixon and Sadat rode by in an open-top limousine (to the chagrin of the Secret Service, which, since the Kennedy assassination, has preferred the President to ride in a closed vehicle). Obviously the demonstrations had been carefully organized; it was unlikely that tens of thousands of Egyptians would have kept pictures of Nixon in their drawers during all the years that Egypt and the United States had had no diplomatic relations. A sound truck blaring “Long live Nixon; long live Sadat” in English hardly appeared by happenstance any more than did the signs: “Peace for the land of peace,” “We trust Nixon.” Several White House staffers at the tail end of the motorcade also claimed that they had seen trucks picking up crowds after the Presidents had passed by to move them further up the parade route, thus generating a double dose of delirium.

  Still, whether the crowds all appeared spontaneously or were in part organized, there was no mistaking the enthusiasm and friendliness that could not have been organized. At a minimum, it meant that Sadat was using Nixon’s trip to underline the irreversibility of the policy on which he was embarked — in itself a significant event. But one reason he chose so demonstrative a method must have been the happiness of the mass of the Egyptian people with a new course that meant an end to war and the beginning of peace. The crowds were in a holiday mood. Many had red flowers in their hands; others waved banners. The Presidents seemed to be propelled to Qubbah Palace by the noise from frenzied multitudes threatening to break through police cordons and jamming balconies to the point that they seemed about to hurtle from bursting buildings.

  Qubbah Palace is a vast, ornate edifice erected by one of the nineteenth-century kings of Egypt as a bow to British royal tradition. It has innumerable rooms, though its overall impact inside is rather that of a slightly rundown luxury hotel in some Eastern European Communist country. Amid splendid gardens, its spectacular facade made an imposing backdrop for the formal arrival ceremony, which was held on its veranda. Sadat celebrated Nixon as a “man of peace.” Nixon saw in his visit an opportunity to “cement the foundations of a new relationship between two great peoples who will dedicate themselves in the future to working together for great causes.” For once on a State visit, the arrival statements reflected a reality: The leaders of both countries were determined to make peace and the people of Egypt seemed rapturous at the thought of it.

  Nixon and Sadat met later that day for talks in Tahra Palace, where I had had my first encounter with the Egyptian President. Sadat used the opportunity to present directly to Nixon his analysis of the Middle East situation, his view of the superpower relationship, and his ideas on the next steps. Much of it was familiar to me, though it was important for the President to hear Sadat’s own passionate presentation — or it would have been had Nixon been in a position to advance the policy he had begun so conspicuously. Sadat put forward the standard Arab program: total Israeli return to the 1967 borders and satisfaction of Palestinian rights. He placed special emphasis on the demand for Egypt’s 1967 borders. As for assembling the Geneva Conference, Sadat favored delay; he was not eager to bring the Soviets back into the act. His device for procrastination was launching prior bilateral talks between the parties — a procedure that we had learned in the Year of Europe is marvelously designed to produce activity without movement.

  Nixon’s response followed his standard pattern. He was acute in his own analysis of the international situation. He was thoughtful about the Middle East. Sadat’s approach to the Geneva Conference was complex enough to appeal to Nixon’s convoluted sense of tactics and there was easy agreement on that. But no more in Cairo than in Washington was Nixon prepared to debate a concrete proposal with which he disagreed. On the question of Israeli withdrawal my briefing papers had given him advice that was as opaque as it was necessary: Since this was an issue for negotiation, he should avoid either endorsing or refusing to endorse the 1967 borders. The deliberate nebulousness of our position would have tested the mettle of even a healthy Nixon not preoccupied with Watergate. Nixon handled it as well as its ambiguity permitted. He resorted to his all-purpose approach of implying that he agreed with his interlocutor’s goals and that tactical problems should be handled by others. He hinted that he was heading in the direction desired by Sadat if by a slower, perhaps more indirect route; the final destination would emerge from the process. Sadat behind his affable exterior was not that easily put off. He persisted tactfully but firmly. Nixon gradually gave ground, making a series of elliptical statements that Sadat could well have construed as fully agreeing with the Egyptian point of view. Nixon cognoscenti would have recognized Nixon’s statements as a means to evade pressure that was becoming uncomfortably specific, as a way to end a difficult subject, not as a national commitment. What Sadat may have thought has gone unrecorded; he seemed happy enough. In all probability, he was not looking for an affirmation that would give him a legal claim on Nixon; his purpose was served by studying Nixon’s reactions to pressure for the 1967 borders.

  That evening Sadat gave a splendid dinner in the garden of Qubbah Palace that, for the edification of Americans who had heard their colleagues’ tales of high life in Cairo, included a spectacular performance by Nagwa Fuad. Sadat delivered an eloquent toast, paying his dues to the Palestinians:

  Mr. President, let me be candid with you lest in the future there would be a misunderstanding or false reading of the turn of events in our region. The political solution and the respect of the national aspirations of the Palestinians are the crux of the whole problem. . . . [T]here is no other solution and no other road for a durable peace without a political solution to the Palestinian problem.

  He offered no concrete proposal to achieve it.

  The next day Sadat took Nixon through the villages of the Nile Delta to Alexandria on a train trip amidst a delirium that dwarfed even the Cairo spectacular. The two leaders rode in an opulent Victorian car with open sides. When they passed through a village, they would show themselves to the crowds, holding on to an overhead rail. A sudden lurch might well have deprived one or both of the countries of its leadership. Signs in English extolling peace were everywhere; the fact that the crowds almost certainly could not read the signs they were carrying in no way dampened their frenzy. They knew that they wanted peace; no governmental directive could produce such universal and wild enthusiasm unless there was deep longing for it and genuine affection for Sadat. The two leaders held a brief press conference on the train, raising again the danger that the jostling press might propel both leaders through the open side of the car, thereby solving the problem of what would be the lead story on the evening news. Nixon reaffirmed the step-by-step approach “not because we want to go slow but because we want to get there.” While he was at it, Nix
on suggested that we would proceed country by country — “first with Egypt” — which, given the distrust among Arab brethren, could hardly have been music to the ears of the rulers of Syria and Jordan. Sadat looked on with avuncular approval, calling attention to the banners that proclaimed: “We trust Nixon.” Nixon must have been musing about how unfortunate it was that Egyptians were not represented on the House Judiciary Committee when Sadat declared:

  Since October 6 and since the change that took place in American policy, peace is now available in the area and President Nixon never gave a word and didn’t fulfill it. . . . He has fulfilled every word he gave. So, if this momentum continues, I think we can achieve peace.

  And Sadat added two pregnant words that were perhaps the most significant uttered by either leader during the day. A reporter asked, in reference to the bilateral talks planned prior to reassembling the Geneva Conference, whether Egypt would talk with Israel. “Not yet,” said Sadat, puffing on his pipe.

  Each reception in Egypt seemed to exceed the one preceding. Alexandria was wild with jubilation. More than a million cheering Egyptians lined the motorcade route from the train station along the coast to the fairy-tale Ras el-Tin Palace — a monumental conceit of Farouk’s father thrown onto a peninsula in the harbor of Alexandria in imitation of Versailles. I calculated that it took ten minutes to walk, even at a brisk pace, from the front portal to my assigned room — if I did not get lost on the way.

  At Ras el-Tin the two leaders reviewed documents that had been prepared for their signature the next day in Cairo. One, grandiloquently entitled “Principles of Relations and Cooperation between Egypt and the United States,” called for sweeping cooperation in scientific, technical, economic, and cultural areas, following a pattern we had already established with Saudi Arabia. We were creating new institutions of bilateral cooperation with Arab countries in many fields for the purpose of cementing political ties. It would take some time for all of these projects to go into high gear. But they represented a network giving various Arab nations a stake in our well-being and creating an obstacle to the political misuse of the oil weapon. (They also gave us a hedge against European bilateralism.)

  Included in this document was a statement on the Middle East whose reference to the Palestinians was virtually identical to that in the 1973 Nixon-Brezhnev summit communiqué. A just settlement, it affirmed, “should take into due account the legitimate interest of all the peoples in the Mideast including the Palestinian people, and the right to existence of all states in the area.” Jerusalem would be unenthusiastic about the first part, pleased with the second. For some reason lost in the mists of time, we also promised to reconstruct the Cairo Opera House burned down some decades earlier. It was the first time a Western nation sought to woo a Middle East state by promising to support an art form having no roots in the area at all. Someday Aïida may be heard there once again, perhaps in honor of a State visit by a President of Ethiopia.

  The most controversial item was an accord not destined for rapid implementation. The two nations pledged to negotiate on cooperation in the field of nuclear energy under agreed safeguards. Our motive was to preempt European maneuvers to use nuclear power as an entering wedge, as France had done in Iraq. We also thought that we could achieve better safeguards against diversion to military uses and had a higher incentive to do so than any other potential supplier. All this was reasonable enough; but the nuclear issue turned out to be too explosive, politically if not literally. Israel protested, its deeper fears masked under the complaint of lack of consultation (we offered Israel a similar accord, but there was disagreement over the inspection provisions). Congress proved leery, the ubiquitous Henry Jackson leading the charge. Not until seven years later was an implementing agreement with Egypt signed.5

  The Nixons hosted a return dinner in Ras el-Tin Palace in a convivial atmosphere inhibited only by the curse inflicted by protocol on State visits that forces one to sit next to the same people at every meal. Inevitably, by the end of the second day one has exhausted all reasonable subjects of conversation and is reduced to the surrealistic or the banal.

  A helicopter trip to Sadat’s rest house overlooking the Pyramids and another ecstatic entry into Cairo, this time from the direction of Giza, concluded the journey. Altogether it was estimated that at least seven million Egyptians had turned out to greet Nixon. By this time the camaraderie between the two leaders had developed to the point that when Sadat expressed admiration for the Presidential helicopter, Nixon made him a gift of it on the spot.

  From ebullient, cosmopolitan Cairo we went to puritanical, aloof, secretive Jiddah, the administrative center of Saudi Arabia, on Friday evening, June 14. Saudi Arabia does not prize abandon in any of its manifestations; it does not believe in making policy in fits of enthusiasm. His Majesty King Faisal, dour of countenance, regal in bearing, was at the airport to escort Nixon to the huge state guest house. The motorcade reflected the Saudi sense of the fitness of things. It might have seemed impolite to have no crowds in the street; it would have been indecorous and totally against Saudi tradition to encourage demonstrative emotions. So we passed what the media would call “respectable” crowds clapping in unison as the closed cars of the leaders rolled by.

  In the large reception hall of the guest house, King Faisal, Nixon, and some aides chatted inconclusively while no doubt Faisal reflected on how the usually impeccable Saudi protocol department had slipped up to permit Mrs. Nixon into his presence. Normally in Saudi Arabia, women are strictly segregated. (On my visits, Nancy had usually disappeared at the airport, not to be seen again until departure, when she rejoined me at the plane with marvelous tales of extraordinary hospitality by the ladies of the Kingdom, whom in turn I never met.) Or maybe the subtle King had arranged the whole thing so that he could pay his respects to the mores of our country and the personality of the First Lady. Whatever the reason, Faisal’s grave mien seemed a shade more doleful on this occasion. Afterward, Saudi custom prevailed. No male member of the American party, except the President, saw Mrs. Nixon until she rejoined us at the airport.

  The Kingdom followed its accustomed pattern. The King at an all-male dinner offered an eloquent toast applauding our role in the Middle East negotiations and adding the obligatory moralism of the need for a Palestinian solution. Nixon in reply reviewed his foreign policy achievements, and in the exuberance of the moment dwelt heavily on his breakthroughs with China and the Soviet Union — on whose dastardly and evil designs, especially of the latter, Faisal discoursed at length during the next day.

  Saudi Arabia, not being a direct party to the Middle East negotiations, was mainly concerned with the direction of American policy rather than the tactical ramifications. Faisal remained true to his method of not exposing himself by needlessly explicit statements. He was receptive to Nixon’s argument that there should be no rush to Geneva; he welcomed the advance notice of our intention to announce resumption of diplomatic relations with Syria during our visit there; he seemed pleased when Nixon described a strong Saudi Arabia as important to the security of the Gulf. The King did not respond to Nixon’s theme that the West Bank negotiations would advance more rapidly if Jordan were Israel’s interlocutor, rather than the PLO. On oil, Faisal indicated a general propensity to lower oil prices, provided the other oil-producing countries heeded his counsel (an unlikely contingency).

  Two impressions emerged from the conversation: Nixon had at last met his match in indirection; I knew by now that the King was more likely to act than to affirm. Still, there was no mistaking the fact that Faisal genuinely admired Nixon. And the King’s farewell statement marked a sharp departure from custom. In addition to a commitment to joint policies in the Middle East, it also contained an explicit reference to American domestic politics:

  What is very important is that our friends in the United States of America be themselves wise enough to stand behind you, to rally around you, Mr. President, in your noble efforts, almost unprecedented in the history of man
kind, the efforts aiming at securing peace and justice in the world. . . .

  And anybody who stands against you, Mr. President, in the United States of America, or outside the United States of America, or stands against us, your friends, in this part of the world, obviously has one aim in mind: namely, that of causing the splintering of the world, the wrong polarization of the world, the bringing about of mischief, which would not be conducive to tranquility and peace in the world.

  As a general rule, chiefs of state do not visit capitals with which no diplomatic relations exist, for the simple reason that the absence of embassies is usually a good indication of the state of political relations. The rule did not seem to apply to Nixon. He broke it twice by scheduling State visits designed not to celebrate friendly relations but to inaugurate them. He had visited Peking in 1972 even though Taipei was still recognized by us as the legitimate government of all of China. And the incongruity of his visit to Damascus was only slightly less. It had been barely six months since we had established communications. But during the May shuttle, Asad had made clear that he wanted Nixon to visit; Asad wanted no second-class status with the country he accepted as the key to peace. But he had surely had major domestic obstacles to overcome. Around the Arab world I had been reliably told that there had been powerful opposition within Syria to the disengagement agreement. I was confident that Nixon would get a good reception; there was no sense for Asad to extend an invitation just to humiliate him. One does not gratuitously make an enemy of the strongest nation in the world.

  The Syrians seemed about to do just that or worse, despite their best intentions, as we approached Damascus on June 15. Syrian protocol prescribes that heads of state be escorted over Syrian air space by a kind of honor guard of Syrian military airplanes. American protocol accepts no such provision; our security people are too afraid of a collision between pilots using different languages. Our preferences had been communicated to the Syrians; they either had been overruled or had not filtered down to lower levels.