Office of the Historian

89. Despatch From the Embassy in Iraq to the Department of State1

No. 504
Baghdad, January 6, 1956.

SUBJECT

  • NIE 30–4–55: The Outlook for U.S. Interests in the Middle East2

I have read with much interest the recent National Intelligence Estimate on the outlook for U.S. interests in the Middle East. In accordance with Mr. Armstrong’s letter of transmittal, I have made the Estimate available to Embassy officers who should see it, including our [less than 1 line of source text not declassified] Service Attachés.

We were urged in Mr. Armstrong’s letter to furnish the Department with our comments and criticisms. Detailed statements prepared by Embassy Officers are attached.3 The only comment which I wish to make—and there is a consensus on this subject here in the Embassy— is that any U.S. decision to abandon the Baghdad Pact would, as the Estimate states in the last paragraph of the Conclusions, “gravely damage the Western position in the Middle East”. My principal criticism of the Estimate is that it presents the pro’s and con’s of this line of action in so balanced a way as to make such a decision appear as a feasible alternative. The arguments advanced for abandoning the Pact are so tenuous as to rule out, in my mind, any serious consideration of that line of action.

I feel strongly, after more than a year in Baghdad, that one thing should be crystal clear: any retreat from our well-known position supporting the Baghdad Pact would undermine U.S. interests in this part of the world by seriously weakening the security of the area, the political stability of countries friendly to the United States, and the confidence of the Middle Eastern countries in the sincerity of the United States.

Colleagues here in Baghdad have, I think, described very well our present anomalous position with regard to the Pact: we get all the blame from critic-countries for supporting it, and none of the credit which our friends in the Pact accord only to fellow members. Our friends still hope that we may soon become full participants in the Pact.

W. J. Gallman
  1. Source: Department of State, Central Files, 101.21–NIS/1–656. Top Secret.↩
  2. Document 78.↩
  3. Not printed.↩