Copy I

November 20, 1968

CONFIDENTIAL

I met today for three and a quarter hours with President Nasser in his house in Cairo. President Nasser received me at noon and, despite my suggestion several times that I was taking too much of his time, kept me until approximately 3:15. We discussed, in the course of the conversation (in which we were alone in his garden receiving room) almost every conceivable subject from the events of the revolution in 1952, the state of armaments in the Egyptian armed forces today, his health, his visits to Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, his discussions with Robert Anderson, through peace plans, air engagements with the Israelis and the beneficial effects of sauna baths. In this memorandum, I will attempt only to hit on the high spots of our conversation.

In general, President Nasser was more relaxed and looking in better health than I have ever seen him. He was in a white sport shirt, laughed a great deal and we joked and spoke extremely frankly. He was probing and thoughtful in his questions and remarks and spoke with his usual charm and candor. At the end of our conversation, he shook hands with me three times on the way to the door and urged me to write to him any time I had any thoughts or suggestions about his current situation. I told him about my forthcoming book and told him that I had attacked him along with others in the book. He laughed and said that was not unusual but what had I said. I told him in detail that I accused him of not understanding the nature of power. He laughed about this as this had been a theme that recurred throughout this conversation and previous ones. He asked me to give him the last pages of my book in which I bring forth a suggestion for a peace plan in the Middle East. After my visit had ended, I had lunch with the Minister of Agriculture and Nasser's personal assistant, Hassan Sabry Al-Kholi. Then at six o'clock Hassan Sabry Al-Kholi called to say that President Nasser had asked Mohammed Hassanein Haikel to visit with me tomorrow morning at 10:30 to resume aspects of the conversation which we had only touched slightly today.

I started our conversation by outlining the desalting project for Alexandria. I pointed out to President Nasser that I saw this as a four-stage operation. In the first stage, now largely completed, preliminary studies would be made on the feasibility, from largely abstract criteria, of the economic aspects of the project. From this material, a pilot project should be prepared.

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In the second stage, which we are now approaching, a pilot desalting complex composed of equipment to convert approximately 10 million gallons of water daily and land irrigated of approximately 3,000 acres, would be undertaken. In the pilot stage, careful and detailed studies would be made of different crops, the technology of salt water conversion, agricultural aspects of the project and, most importantly I felt, of sociological, cultural, health, and "political" aspects of the project. I laid particular stress on these latter factors as the only conceivable way of avoiding the horrendous mistakes made during the Industrial Revolution in the cities. I pointed out to President Nasser that if these studies were correctly undertaken, he could hope to carry forward the creation of the "new men" into the rural sector of his society. We discussed this at some length and he professed complete agreement with my project. I then indicated that the final result of the pilot project stage would be the completion of a proposal, presumably to the World Bank and/or the Kuwait Fund, to fund the third stage. In the third stage, approximately 350,000 acres would be irrigated and in the fourth stage, this would be multiplied ten fold. He asked me about the time table for these events and I indicated that I hoped that we could get started in January on the pilot stage and that this would run for approximately four years. The third stage could be finished roughly by 1977 and the fourth stage by the end of the 1980's.

He said several times that when this had first been reported to him he thought these were largely dreams but, he emphasized, dreams must be followed. Several times in the conversation he mentioned the fact that he was now a grandfather (at the age of 51) and that he felt that it was critical for Egypt to move to a stage of preparing for future generations. I pointed out to him that I felt the project was risky but that we should be able to prove it out during the pilot stage and that my hope was that we in the United States could raise the hard currency component of the project if he were willing to have his government subscribe the Egyptian currency. He said, "We must do this."

Inter alia we discussed the issues of family planning. I emphasized that I felt it would be tragic to undertake the technological aspects of the study only to create either new slums around automated, advanced, industrial, agricultural projects or to simply give the basis of a new explosion of population. President Nasser said he completely agreed but that he was baffled by the population problem. We discussed

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the project the Stevenson Institute has in India, which I explained in general terms, and he laughingly said, "we are doing no better than the Indians." He said, "You know, here in the cities we have the cinema and television to occupy us in the evenings but in the villages making love is the only way that a man can find any pleasure. And so, children come." He said that he would have no objection to our planning very carefully the family planning aspects but that he felt that we would have a great deal of trouble trying to control too tightly the movement of people into the area and educational standards.

I pointed out the contrast between the 1858 Egyptian and Ottoman land laws with their emphasis on mulk and miri as categories of land ownership. Nasser appeared to be delighted by this example and said, "Yes, this is exactly the kind of thing we must know and this is what you must find out in the pilot project."

I discussed with President Nasser also the Tom Sorensen-Sy Weintraub project for a film in Egypt and explained this to him in some detail. President Nasser appeared to be delighted by the project and indicated that he was prepared to move ahead with it. He said, however, that funding may be a problem. I emphasized that it is the problem. He asked me to discuss this further with his Minister of Culture which I will do tomorrow at two o'clock. He did say, however, in closing this subject that he felt we must move ahead with it and he fully understood the repercussions on tourism and on the Egyptian "image" abroad.

This led me into a discussion of Egypt's image and of the dilemma in which Egypt finds itself as a consequence of the Arab-Israeli conflict. I indicated to him my own views on the confusion of real and apparent power and the high cost that Egypt pays for buying large amounts of Soviet equipment on the one hand and on the other hand, the facile equation in the West of the Egyptians with the American Negroes and the Israelis with the American and other European Jews and the transposition of this into the David and Goliath story. We discussed this for quite a long time in various ramifications including the course of fighting in the last war.

We particularly discussed his relationship with various sectors of his own government and army. President Nasser emphasized the fact that in his military and his intelligence

forces had largely isolated themselves and had built independent bases of power. He said that he had warned his military chiefs some days before the outbreak of fighting that the closure of the Straits of Tiran would definitely lead to fighting but that this was not the opinion of his intelligence force or his military. As late as Saturday before the war, he said that he had indicated to them that the Israelis would certainly attack on Monday but had been categorically refuted by his military leaders. He said of Field Marshall Amr that he was closer to him than a brother but that people in the intelligence organization were constantly seeking to drive a wedge between them and had, apparently, convinced Amr that Nasser intended to get rid of him.

We reviewed the course of the fighting and course of events leading up to the war. I told President Nasser that as a student of him, I was convinced that the man who had made the largest impression on his thinking about strategy was John Foster Dulles. He burst out laughing and said yes, that is quite true. We then discussed brinksmanship, the Cuba missile crisis, the Bay of Pigs, Soviet actions on Czechoslovakia and the events leading up to the June War. I will not review those here except to say that President Nasser apparently bought completely the argument of the events that I put forward in my chapter in *The United States and the Arab World*.

We then discussed the question of personnel in the Egyptian government. I indicated to him my own feeling about the difference between real and apparent power by suggesting that the major missing ingredient in Egypt was middle level man power. I told him that I felt he only weakened his case by buying more military equipment because he did not have the society upon which to base it. I pointed out that in driving to his house in the last few blocks I had passed several thousand people in the streets with probably less than one per thousand who could in any way understand President Nasser's program or could do anything serious to facilitate its execution. Nasser nodded in agreement. I pointed out, in contrast, that if one drove down the streets of Tel Aviv he would be sure to find that 90 out of 100 people could not only understand but contribute to the effectiveness of an Israeli government program and that this was the basic disparity between the two countries, not the number of tanks or airplanes involved. Nasser said that he quite understood and agreed with this proposition but that after all the Israelis had occupied Egyptian territory and that he was under great pressure, naturally, to acquire the military means of protecting Egyptian territory and of ousting the invaders.

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We reverted several times after this to the likelihood of an outbreak of major fighting. I suggested to him my own belief that it is likely to occur before the end of this year. He professed to be surprised by this pronouncement and asked my why I thought so. I told him that I believed that he had executed the most dangerous of all moves in world politics, namely, putting his adversaries in a corner from which they had no logical move. He asked me to elaborate on this further and I suggested that the Israelis, after having done their utmost in the June War now found themselves little better or no better off than they were before. Indeed, they now found themselves in the dangerous position of having internalized the Arab-Israeli problem to a greater extent than ever before. I suggested that if I were planning Israeli strategy I would feel it absolutely necessary to prevent encouragement of internal terrorist and guerrilla activities such as everyone knew the Egyptians were encouraging. I would not, I suggested, be concerned about his acquisition of formal military power but I would be concerned about the bifurcation and further polarization of the Israeli and Israeli-dominated community. We discussed this, Vietnam, Yemen and Algeria in considerable detail. Nasser said, of course, "I do not have final control over the terrorists." I replied that this was inevitably the case in all such issues, pointing out that after President Kennedy had issued his orders on the blockade of Russian ships, he had lost control himself of the situation and I told the story of Barbara Tuchman's *The Guns of August* and its impact on President Kennedy. President Nasser had read Robert Kennedy's article on the Cuba missile crisis and we discussed this in some detail.

We then came to concrete issues of war and peace. He asked me what I would do if I were in his place at this time. I suggested to him that I thought there were two major courses of action ahead. The one upon which he was embarked at this time appeared to me to lead definitely to warfare in which Egypt could only be further hurt and humiliated while the other, apparently more dangerous and more far out, might be the only one offering any real hope. He asked me to elaborate this and I told him that I had indeed written it down and he asked me to pass it along to him today which I plan to do. In fact, this is the last section of my book, *The United States and the Arab World*.

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President Nasser told me of his most recent conversation with Robert Anderson. He said that Anderson had told him point blank that Egypt had two choices: "either to surrender to the Soviet Union or to surrender to Israel." President Nasser said he had been absolutely astonished by this and had thought about it a good deal since Anderson's visit and discussed it with most of the members of his government. He said, "If this is indeed the real choice, then we must surrender to the Soviet Union." I emphatically disagreed that these were the real choices. I did say, however, that I felt it would take a great deal of wit and wisdom on his part -- and I stressed that he was the only Arab capable of making this move -- to prevent a catastrophe in the weeks ahead. What this meant, I emphasized and reemphasized, was a turning away from reliance on overt military force. This is what I called apparent power. Nasser questioned me again on the meaning of apparent power. I said that I meant by this the reliance on the tools and toys of warfare rather than on the development of an educated, coherent and dedicated population. The latter, I stressed, was the work of schools and of decades while the former, apparently available on order from the Soviet Union, was a snare and a delusion which could not only cost Egypt years in its development process but might well cause the destruction of Nasser's government.

We came back to this point repeatedly. At this time, I suggested, that the Israelis, having failed to accomplish the political purposes which the June War was really all about were faced with the dilemma today of seeing Egypt rearm itself to a point which they might regard as dangerous. It seemed to me that the same factors could be operative today as in May of '67 and that this time the Israelis, in desperation, must try not simply to destroy the Egyptian Air Force (at this point President Nasser intervened to point out that it would not be possible this time since the Egyptians had built cover for their aircraft and had their other equipment widely dispersed. He also pointed out that in the first hours after the war began he discovered that he only had a handful of tanks out of the thousand that he started with and practically no airplanes.) This time I stressed the Israelis would have to try to destroy him and his government, gambling on the fact that something easier to work with might follow them. He laughed and said that this was the prospect of Operation Musketeer in the 1956 war. I looked at my watch and said, you never can tell, they might be trying to do it right now. For the only time in the conversation, he looked quite startled at me but I emphasized that if I were planning Israeli strategy, I would feel myself at this point to be in a corner from which the only thing I could was to increase military pressure in the only sensitive point, namely against President Nasser himself. The great danger, I emphasized, of all strategies is putting the other side in a corner from which he has nothing

to lose and can only strike out blindly. This was the thing, I emphasized, that President Kennedy was most intent on not doing during the Cuba missile crisis. The President said that he fully understood this position but what could he do. We discussed, at some length, the pressures upon him by his own military for rearmament and for retaliatory raids. He hinted several times at his own problem of achieving a sensitive, far-seeing and accurate intelligence. He pointed out, for example, that in the raid on upper Egypt which he put out as an air raid, he did so because this was the first report that he received on it. He then told me in detail what in fact the raid had consisted of.

I emphasized to him my own evaluation of the situation in terms of the contrast between Zambia and Rhodesia, pointing out that Egypt was now widely despised throughout the world both for vain boastfulness and then for inept performance and that he, President Nasser, was widely regarded as a modern Hitler, a dangerous figure on the world stage who had no ideas of moving toward peace, indeed, a man with whom peace could not be made. This, he retorted, was absolutely untrue.

I urged him, in rebuttal to my point and the belief of many others around the world about him that he put together, at this time, an Egyptian peace package, those things for which he would agree to move.

He thought for quite a while and then said, "you know, we cannot give on any element of territory." I questioned him in detail about each piece. He said it was not simply a matter of Egypt as Dean Rusk has asked him to emphasize but that rather Egypt could not agree to the diminution of the Arab cause in any particular. We went point by point on the Golan Heights, Jerusalem, the West Bank, Gaza and Sinai. On each of these he was completely inflexible and emphasized again that there could be no change of territory. I said that it was my belief, if I were in the Israeli government, that I would insist on the demilitarization of the Golan Heights, I would insist on the change of the frontier in the Gaza area to move the frontier further from Tel Aviv and that it was my belief that the Israelis would not agree to do anything on Jerusalem. I asked whether internationalization of Jerusalem was a real possibility and he said that, at this time, internationalization effectively only meant internationalization of the Arab area and this was not likely to lead very far since the Israelis, with determination, money and skill would undoubtedly undermine the Arab position even in an internationalized area. He said, "you know, it is often said that there are 100 million Arabs. Of course, there are not 100 million Arabs. It is usually said

that there are only 2 million Jews in Israel but there are not
2 million Jews in Israel. There are many millions abroad who
are for all intentional purposes their full supporters. They
have had a plan since the time of Herzl and they have carried
it forward point by point with precision and persistence. They
will continue to do so in the future."

I reverted to the question of an Egyptian peace package,
pointing out that President Nasser's Foreign Minister had, in
his United Nations press conference, indicated a great many
things on which real movement could be made and suggested to
him that he combine these into an Egyptian approach to peace
enunciating a position to get some movement toward peace talks
begun. I suggested to him, as an earnest of his move in this
direction that he consider a unilateral ending of the problem
of the Straits of Tiran: simply by having Egypt adhere to the
International Treaty, which I pointed out the Soviet Union had
also signed, on free use of international waterways. This, I
pointed out, would prevent him from having to knuckle under to
Arab hawks who urged him to close the waterway. This touched
a vibrant chord in his memory and he told me of a number of
times in which his own military had tried to force him to close
the Straits, going back to 1965. They had, he said, pointedly
remarked that even King Farouk had closed the Straits of Tiran.

Seizing upon this point, I suggested that it was ephemeral
to think, as a number of Arabs do, that the advent of the Nixon
Administration would create a more favorable climate for the
concourse of our two nations in itself. I suggested, using his
analogy of his own military that the ability of a statesman to
operate is largely conditional upon the norm which is accepted
by the affected parts of his population and government and that
even he, President Nasser, with all of his power, was indicating
how clearly limited was his own freedom of action. I suggested
that in the best of circumstances, a statesman's freedom of
action might be 25% and that the Nixon Administration might,
conceivably, have 3% more or 3% less latitude than a Humphrey
Administration in regard to the Middle East. But, I emphasized,
what was really important was to work on the other 75%. Thus,
when President Nasser left open the issue of the closure of the
Straits he left to his own enemies and to those within his
government who were trying to push him, the capability of doing
so. They could, since this issue had not been foreclosed, use
it as a lever to move him in directions in which events got out
of his control. But, if he moved ahead to foreclose this
possibility, for example by the International Treaty on the use
of the waterways, he would restrict the course of action open

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to those who were trying to push him and would in fact allow
himself more latitude in his actions.

At this point, the conversation began to become circular
and we went back over many of the previous points we had
discussed. In touching on personnel, we discussed the case
of Salah Dessouki, my good friend who was the Governor of
Cairo. Nasser told me that he was still very annoyed with
Dessouki whom he had sent to Finland, as he put it, "to put
him on ice". He indicated that his annoyance with Dessouki
was because of Dessouki's assumption of aristocratic ways
but told me what close friends he and Dessouki had been before
the revolution. He pointed out that in the only assassination
attempt in which he was involved, the arms for the attempt had
been stored in Dessouki's house although Dessouki was out of
the country. He then told me with great laughter the story
which appears in the philosophy of the revolution.

Finally, for the fourth or fifth time, I suggested that
I should leave him and we stood up. I remarked that he seemed
in quite good health and we discussed his treatment in the
Soviet Union, his back trouble and his diabetes. He has a
pinched nerve, similar to mine, which affects his left leg
and last year after the troubles, his diabetes got temporarily
out of control. When he told me about his back, I asked him
if he used a bed board. We discussed the methods of sleeping
for quite a while and I urged to sleep with a pillow between
his knees as I do. He said that he had always done that be-
cause he was unable to sleep on his back and asked why I
did not use the medicine that I suggested to him, sleeping
on my back. I said that I could not sleep that way and he
roared with laughter and said neither could he. I told him
about my sauna and urged him to get one. He told me that he
would deputize Hassan Sabry Al-Kholi to get one and would try
this out. We then shook hands warmly for the first of several
times and started walking slowly toward the door. He led me
all the way out to the car, repeated several times how much
he had enjoyed the visit and asked me to get in touch with him
either through the United Nations or his office in Washington
or directly any time I could and to come see him on any occasion
that offered itself. He promised complete and absolute support for
the Stevenson Institute program and said that he would move as
rapidly as he could to appoint an official to head the separate
authority that he was establishing for the desalinization scheme.
He said that he thought this would probably be Mahmud Yunis,
whom I had suggested, to lend the project real stature and to
head it with a man of energy and determination. I pointed out
to him that unless this were done, the whole project could be

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bogged down in the bureaucratic morrass. He sighed and said, yes,
he understood very well how that could happen but that we must not
let it do so. Again, he made me promise that I would communicate
to him in writing my suggestions for bringing the Israeli conflict
to a halt and promised to give them very serious attention.

As I left his office at 3:15, Hassan Sabry Al-Kholi was
waiting for me across the street, absolutely delighted at how
long the President had kept me and pointing out that he had
broken a number of other engagements for this purpose. Since
he is acting as President, Prime Minister and Chief of the Army,
he is burdened with a tremendous number of meetings and perfor-
mances.

William R. Polk

DEC 19 1968

THE ADLAI STEVENSON INSTITUTE
OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

ROBIE HOUSE 5757 SOUTH WOODLAWN AVENUE
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS 60637
312-684-3200

WILLIAM R. POLK
DIRECTOR

CABLE ADDRESS ASIIA

December 13, 1968

Professor Henry Kissinger
Center for International Studies
Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts

Dear Henry,

Enclosed you will find typescripts of three of
the interviews that I had in the Middle East, with
President Nasser, with the Shah of Iran and with the
President of Turkey.

You will note that these read somewhat roughly.
I dictated them immediately after leaving each inter-
view and mailed the tapes back to the United States.
In fact, I have only just today read the final version.
For your purposes, I would imagine that the unvarnished
text would be better than a edited edition.

I am returning to the Middle East on the 17th of
January for another long session with the Shah, a talk
with the King of Saudi Arabia and with the Prime Minister
of Libya and perhaps also again with Nasser.

The central two themes that I think these discussions
bring forward are these:

1) There is a great deal possible to do, without
significant commitment or cost to our government, which
would make the American position in the Middle East much
safer and more constructive.

2) The "Middle East" is a very different set
of issues and problems when viewed from different angles.
In some ways the most interesting aspect of the three

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conversations was the emphasis on the different
angularity of vision from Ankara, Tehran and Cairo.
One of the things which you clearly will face in
the government is an extreme rigidity of the angle
of vision in the federal bureaucracy. Indeed, this
angle of vision is built into the structure of the
bureaucracy. It is not only a matter of "localitis"
but also the encapsulation of areas and interests in
offices.

Early in your career you are undoubtedly going
to have to decide what to recommend to the President
should be done about the Arab-Israeli issue. In
essence, the position of the Johnson Administration
after the Spring of 1967 was to stay out of Middle
Eastern affairs. That is not, I believe, either a
useful or a possible position for very long. On the
other hand, it is clear that it is not necessary to
recreate all of the old dilemmas by the reopening
of diplomatic relations. I suspect that you have
a "moment" (which might last as long as six months)
of great flexibility in this regard. It is my
considered opinion that a great deal could be done
to move forcefully and proximately toward a major
amelioration if not a solution of the Arab-Israeli
problem. It is clear that this will have to be
done with great finesse and skill and vigor.
Similarly, it is my strong opinion that the United
States can greatly improve this position all over
the Mediterranean world by carefully considered
and intelligently executed diplomatic maneuvers.
This need not take, and probably should not take,
the nature of a giveaway aid program or a military
assistance program. Most of the people in the
Middle East suffer from the same kinds of problems
of humiliation we are now increasingly familiar
with in the American Negro community. A dignified
approach may be worth all the aid and military
equipment we can possibly muster.

I am sure you realize, Henry, that I am not
seeking and indeed could not even accept a position
in the government for myself. However, I would like
you to know that I am at your disposal in any way
that I can help with advice or limited involvement.

With warm personal regards and best wishes,

COPY I

CONFIDENTIAL

I met with President Cevdet Sunay at 5 P.M. December 2, 1968 at his residence. We had met first some years ago when he was Chief of the Armed Forces of Turkey and I was in the Policy Planning Council. At that time, General Sunay was heading a promotions panel with the other members of the Turkish General Staff in Erzurum in Eastern Anatolia. He was extraordinarily cordial to me then and has been on each of our meetings since. He visited Chicago during his official visit to the United States in 1967 and on this occasion I presented him with a folder of photographs of his visit and also a copy of the University of Chicago Press book by Aptullah Kuran on Ottoman architecture.

I then told him briefly of my recent talks with the Shah of Iran, President Nasser and President Azhary of the Sudan.

Turning to Nasser, President Sunay commented that this reminded him of the Turkish saying about *hunk!* The Turks say that there is always a group of people who pound up coffee in a mortar and pestle. There is the man who does the pounding and then there are the others around him who encourage him by saying *hunk*, *hunk*, *hunk*. Nasser and the Arabs are like this. Nasser does the pounding but the surrounding Arabs in fact encourage him."

However, he said Arab unity as such is really not possible at this time because of the vast disparity in development and social organization in the various Arab countries. He reviewed in some detail the situation in various Arab countries with particular emphasis on Kurdistan and Iraq. (In the past, Turkish intelligence has been extraordinarily good on Iraq). The Kurds today, he pointed out, find the Israeli issue a convenient excuse for their inability to beat the Kurds. The fact that Iraq has 10,000 soldiers in Jordan gives it a plausible reason for being unable to defeat the Kurdish guerrilla insurgency but this is of course ridiculous, the President commented, since the Iraqis have 70,000 troops in Iraq itself. The President alluded to the massive support given by the Shah of Iran and Israel to the Kurds and obviously was not too keen about this trifling with the forces of nationalism on the Turkish frontier.

Indeed, the sobriety of the Turkish government and particularly of President Sunay is one of its most appealing characteristics in the volatility of the Middle East. Time after time in our conversation Sunay made a gesture of contempt for the petty hostilities and ambitions of the Middle East. One feels extremely strongly even entering Turkey, the solidity of the bureaucratic structure and perhaps the influence either or both of Turkey's imperial past and its

European affiliation.

In Egypt, the President continued, there is neither the moral fiber nor the capability for modern warfare. Nasser personally, he commented, was incompetent to direct an army since he was only a junior officer when he went into politics. Here spoke General Sunay the paragon of Turkish military bureaucracy: Nasser was not really a professional since he had never commanded large scale troops in the field and his activities smacked of the impertinence of a junior officer aspiring to major command.

I told the President what I had told President Nasser about the three lines of policy possible to him (warfare and defeat, some degree of accommodation but still economic stagnation or slow development and a move toward isolationism with heavy emphasis on development.) I also pointed out that in my view the principal problem was whether the Egyptians would in fact be able to opt for real as opposed to apparent power, i.e. to develop their internal resources rather than buying the fancy toys of warfare. The President heartily agreed and said that he thought this was the question of the Middle East, but, he emphasized, Nasser was not only pushed by the other Arab countries but was pinned into position by the nature of the Arab-Israeli conflict. There were, he continued, two possibilities for the Middle East: 1) if Vietnam could be satisfactorily settled, the United States moved strongly and actively toward peace in the Middle East or, 2) if the Soviet activities could lead, as the President believes they are likely to and intended to, to the renewal of war in which the Soviet Union will doubtlessly be of little help to the Arabs but will be of major menace to the other countries in the area. The Soviet purposes, he continued, in the United Arab Republic are to have an army favorable to the Soviet Union and, in event of war with Israel, to develop for themselves a major diplomatic opening.

I replied that while I agreed with the general conclusions, I thought it was most unlikely in the near future as it has been in the past that the United States would intervene in a significant or effective way. Sunay said that he generally agreed with this lamentably. I asked if this meant that Turkey intended to try to play any larger role in the Middle Eastern sphere as the Shah had told me Iran intended to play. He replied that during the recent United Nations General Assembly meeting, the Turkish Foreign Minister had met with the Foreign Ministers of a number of the Arab countries. This, he said, led to a flurry of rumors that Turkey, as an Islamic country, was taking the leadership in building some sort of new Middle Eastern position. Before Turkey even had a chance to refute the rumor itself, there were outcries against this move in the various Arab countries. Again, both in word and in gesture, the President eschewed a venturesome policy for Turkey in the Middle East.

The only solution for the Arab-Israeli conflict, he indicated, was an agreement between the United States and the Soviet Union. In this connection, he said, Turkey might play a role.

It occurred to me as he said these things that two aspects of Turkish past shown forth in the President's comments: the first is Turkey's definitive and apparently revocable decision to get out of the business of being an empire and the second is its strong identification with Europe rather than with the Middle East.

I raised the question of the current Yugoslav nervousness and the possible consequences of Soviet action in Europe but these did not seem to excite the President very much and he merely commented that he did not believe the Soviet Union would make the mistake of invading Yugoslavia.

Commenting that this was much the feeling of the Shah, I then raised the Shah's attitude toward Persian policy in the Middle East and particularly in the Persian Gulf. I commented that the Shah had dismissed Turkey's role in the Middle East, saying "Turkey is in NATO." The President first smiled approvingly and then indicated he did not fully understand the meaning of this. I replied that the Shah saw the Middle Eastern situation largely in terms of the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Peninsula and indicated that it would be impossible for Turkey to play any role in this area. Looking at the map, the President frowned and asked me to explain further. I commented that what presumably the Shah meant was that in between the Arabian Peninsula and Turkey was a belt of countries more or less impervious to Turkish activities. The President said the Turkish equivalent of bunk and then went on to comment that he felt that Persian policy in the Persian Gulf has been wrong but that the Persians were now learning some degree of wisdom. I asked him to explain this more fully and he said that Persia's attempt to thrust itself forward raised the question of whether the Shah was not doing more than the Persians were capable of sustaining. However, today, he said it was his understanding that the agreement between King Faisal of Saudi Arabia and the Shah had resolved the differences on the Persian Gulf. I told him that the Shah had indicated to me that Bahrein issue was still outstanding. President Sunay waved this aside and said that that was a small matter and that he felt that the Persian policy had come to recognize the limit of Persia's capability. I did not raise the point but it is my feeling that this is by no means the case, that the Persian role is expanding rather than diminishing.

I had then been with the President for almost an hour and as he has in the past, he showed signs of tiring but he asked me to stay longer. I did only for a few moments for politeness sake and we discussed the University of Chicago program and he asked how Turkish studies were developing. I thanked him on behalf of the University for the continuation of the $15,000 a year grant (during

the afternoon the Secretary General of CENTO, Turgut Menemencioglu
had called on me and discussed this matter among a number of
other things. Menemencioglu had been Turkish Ambassador to Wash-
ington when the grant was announced and he assured me that it was
very difficult for the Turks to pay out even this amount of hard-
currency but that he was sure they would continue it now. However,
he said, there was very little chance that it would be raised to
the $50,000 a year we had originally agreed upon.

As I was leaving, the President escorted me to the door and
shaking hands warmly asked me to call on him any time that I was
back in Turkey and assured me that he would always regard me as
a personal friend and a friend of his government.

COPY I

CONFIDENTIAL

Accompanied by Thomas C. Sorensen, I met the Shah at Niravand Palace at 4:30 Sunday afternoon, December 1. After about 15 minutes wait in an anteroom, Sorensen and I saw Mr. Alam, the Minister of Court, for a moment in the hallway. He was dressed in a boy scout leader uniform and greeted us most cordially. We said good-bye there and arranged that I would return with the architect, Walter Netsch, of the Pahlavi Building on January 18, 1969.

Sorensen and I then walked into the Shah's office, a room about 60 feet long and perhaps 40 feet wide, decorated in the Persian style with mirrors. On the floor were a magnificent collection of carpets and the Shah's desk was at the north end of the room. He escorted us to the southern end of the room and asked me to sit beside him on a large sofa.

After introducing Mr. Sorensen, I was about to start telling him the purpose of my visit when he immediately asked what progress there had been on the building in Chicago. I told him that the building was going well and that I planned to bring the architect back with me with a painting of the completed building, the model he had requested and other drawings and perspectives on January 18. He was delighted by this. I then told him that we also planned to have a festival of Persian arts and music and an exhibition of Persian paintings on October, 1970 opening date. I indicated that I was working out the details of this with Hossein Nasr and that we hoped, additionally, to publish a book on Persian architecture at the same time. Again, he indicated his delight with this scheme. I told him that I thought it would be possible, relatively soon, to undertake the sort of sophisticated program in Persian studies we had originally discussed and that I was relying heavily on the help of Tehran University in moving in this direction.

Next I turned to a project which Mr. Sorensen wished to discuss with him.

Lastly, I told him that I was planning to give a talk to the Council on Foreign Relations and perhaps a report to friends of the Adlai Stevenson Institute in Chicago on my discussions with President Nasser of Egypt, President Azhari of the Sudan, His Majesty and the President of Turkey. He asked me how I had found President Nasser. I described the nature of my discussion with President Nasser rather briefly and he replied, "Of course, he may say that to you, but his past record shows that he will say one thing in adversity and when he gets out of the corner do quite another." Conversely, he went on to say, the Israelis must recognize that they must not push their luck too far. World opinion, which has opened many doors for them, would speedily turn against them if they appeared now to be the aggressors and the "bullies" of the

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Middle East. Iran, he said, was opposed in principle to the
occupation of territory of another power by force. He stressed
that this must be the principle of Iran for purely egotistical
reasons, since Iran would not tolerate, could not tolerate -- but
he stressed would never have to tolerate -- occupation of Persian
territory by the Soviet Union.

This led him to revert to a theme which he had mentioned
earlier with Mr. Sorensen of his bitterness at what his father
experienced at the hands of the great powers. His father, he
pointed out, has been driven into exile "because he would not
bend". He pointed out that while there may have been purely
moral reasons, saying ironically that he was sure there were
no factors of economics or great power politics involved in the
Second World War, but that the intervention of one state in the
affairs of another was always bound to be unhappy and potentially
disastrous. "I was a puppet," he said in the early years of his
reign because this was the only way he could survive. Then, as
he gradually began to assert his independence, came the period
of 1961 and 1962 when, he said, looking sharply and coldly at
both Sorensen and me, the Kennedy Administration tried to force
him too hard to undertake programs it thought wise for Iran. I
intervened, at that point, to discuss some of the policy aspects
of the Kennedy Administration and he dropped the point. He went
on to say, however, that the issue of foreign intervention in
Iran was now a thing of the past. "Today," he said, "they come
to us, from all corners of the world, and we only have to consider
which offer to accept." "We have taken off."

Nevertheless, he continued, the problems of external inter-
vention in the affairs of another nation were by no means dead in
the world today. He pointed to the Czech example and said, "Of
course, they would not fight, perhaps they could not but they
never have." With Yugoslavia, he pointed out, it was quite a
different situation for the Yugoslavs would certainly fight and
he made it quite clear that he would expect the Persians to do so
too under similar circumstances. Tito was now a much better friend
than he was of Nasser. Nasser, the Shah pointed out, not only
maintained an aloof position on Yugoslavia but in fact loudly hewed
the Russian line on Czechoslovakia.

The real problem, he pointed out, was what would happen in
certain sensitive areas of the world. In the Mediterranean, he
indicated, any move by the United States to withdraw the Sixth
Fleet, even if matched by compensatory moves by the Soviet Union,
would throw open the issue of Turkey. The only way out of this
dilemma would be for the United States to establish missile bases
in Spain. Both Sorensen and I had the impression that the Shah
misunderstood aspects of the NATO and U.S. missile capability and
its relationship to the Sixth Fleet. Sorensen pointed out that

the Polaris submarine would not be treated as a part of the Sixth Fleet or at least had not been so treated in the past. He questioned what the advantages would be of missile bases in Spain and pointed out the sensitivity of previous missile bases in Turkey. The Shah affirmed that he felt very strongly that compensatory moves would have to be taken in Spain beyond the present American air bases and the naval base at Rota. The United States, he pointed out, no longer treated the Mediterranean as a Western preserve but had in fact "cut in" the Russians at the time of the May-June, 1967 crisis. The real question was, therefore, how far the Soviets would go. He did not, he stressed, believe that the Soviets would in fact invade Yugoslavia because it was perfectly clear to them what the cost of this would be.

This led him to turn, to the second aspect of Soviet policy in the Middle East, the supply of armaments to certain of the Arab countries. If, he said, it is true that the Egyptians have in fact started to receive 200 MIG-23's, this introduced a very new element in the balance of power. I questioned him on this and his reply, true to character, was a heavy emphasis on the military technology involved.

The MIG-23, whose performance characteristics he recited, was not only capable of carrying a nuclear weapon but also was substantially faster than the Phantom jets on which he is now relying. I questioned whether this was really a significant issue and he projected a "scenario" in which Egyptian jets might be stationed, not at Helwan or Aswan but at Habbaniyah in Iraq. The real point of danger, as he sees it, is in Egyptian expansion into the Arabian Peninsula.

I questioned whether or not this was a serious possibility as long as the Arab-Israeli issue is outstanding but also pointed out the irony of the Egyptian and Israeli armament struggle and its effect on neighboring countries.

This led us into a discussion of his recent meeting with King Faisal of Saudi Arabia.

He described Faisal as "my friend. We embraced when we met." But, he pointed out, the issue of the continental shelf land and the mineral rights of the Persian Gulf, had been a nagging issue between them for a long time. That, he said, was at last resolved.

Saying that, "We did not ask the British to leave", the Shah emphasized that "Iran will not accept a situation in which the British leave by the front door and return by the back door." As I questioned him on this, he indicated that precisely, he meant that Bahrein, an area taken away from Iran, would have to have its

status reconsidered. Gesturing toward his telephone, he said, "Of course, I don't intend to send a few soldiers there" but he did indicate that something like a plebiscite to ascertain the wishes of the people of Bahrein would be required. In general, he continued, Iran intended to develop the power to replace the British in the Persian Gulf. "We do not seek new responsibilities," he said, "but we do intend to control, whether with others of our neighbors or alone, the Persian Gulf area." "We are now developing the capacity to do this and we do not intend to have other great powers intervene there." Asked about the status of Kuwait, the Shah said, rather sharply, "We were the first to recognize Kuwait." It is probably that he was reacting to the attempted pro-Persian coup d'état which took place during his visit to Kuwait recently and which he was at great pains to disavow.

Warning that it was very important for the United States to choose certain areas of the world and among potential friends to support, he said that of course the United States would continue to bear a heavy responsibility for the maintenance of independence in the world and could not avoid this. However, it was very important for the United States not to seek puppets and not to rely on those who could not maintain their own independence. This had been the disaster of our policy in Vietnam. While we were invited in by the government, that government spoke for no one. He had supported our policy in Vietnam, he said, until the Indonesian coup d'état. There are, "some jobs which are dirty but which must be done and Vietnam was one of these until the Indonesian revolution." Stressing that he would not speak against his friend, President Johnson, he said that nonetheless he disagreed with American policy strongly in Vietnam.

As for the Middle East, he said, the United States would make a serious mistake on relying totally on Israel and that in default of Israel, Iran was the only power upon which the United States could rely for the maintenance of independence of the area. When I asked him about Turkey, in this connection, he dismissed Turkey with a wave of his hands, saying "Turkey is part of NATO." In any case, he went on, Turkey is separated from the real field of activity, the Arabian Peninsula, by Syria, Lebabon, Jordan and Israel. Iran, to the contrary, has direct access.

Moreover, he said, the United States and Western Europe were heavily dependent upon Middle Eastern oil and its denial to Europe was clearly one of the remaining Soviet objectives in the Middle East. I questioned him fairly sharply on this point and he affirmed that the United States could only supply Europe with petroleum for a short period of time. When I suggested that in addition to domestic American reserves, Venezuela, Algerian and Libya might be usable,

he said, "The Algerians and Libyans are Arabs and you would not last long there." American petroleum reserves, he stressed, were good for only ten years. Meanwhile, European consumption is rising rapidly. In these circumstances, he stressed, the position of the Persian Gulf is practically vital. I indicated that I thought increasingly it might be more important for Japan than for Europe. He said that was true that it was important for Japan but again stressed its world wide importance.

Stressing that he "had a future here" he said that it was perfectly clear that it was to America's interest to rely heavily upon his regime as one determined and capable of maintaining its independence.

This led him to a discussion of domestic Persian affairs. He spoke with genuine conviction of "our revolution", saying that the maintenance of independence was merely only the means to enable the country to carry out a genuine social revolution. This had gone so far, he said, that even underground waters were nationalized so that any man digging a well on his own land would be told how much water he could draw so as not to deplete the national reserves or to unfairly sap the reserves of his neighbor. Free enterprise, he said, was a very important social system but that unbridled, it became a monster. "We do not intend to allow unbridled exploitation of man by man." Heavy stress, in our conversation, was laid on the establishment of a new sort of VISTA program for young women. It was decided, to make this voluntary and it was thought that 2,500 places would be a reasonable hope. However, he said, 10,000 girls had volunteered this year.

Turning, in conclusion, to the attitude of outside powers about Iran, he said that there are those who know what we are doing and approve and those whom we cannot reach no matter what we say. He was bitterly annoyed by the outside criticism of Iran
Walking us to the door, he shook hands gravely and told me that he would be glad to see me again in January.