Foreign Relations of the United States, 1955–1957, Arab-Israeli Dispute, 1955, Volume XIV

58. Letter From the Ambassador in Egypt (Byroade) to the Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern, South Asian, and African Affairs (Allen)¹

Cairo,March 27, 1955.

Dear George: I am sending the attached by letter for two reasons. The first is that I do not at this point know whether to attach any great significance to this talk with Fawzi. I have the feeling that he was talking as Fawzi the Intellectual Cosmopolite—as contrasted to Fawzi the realistic Arab Politician. He does, I find, play both roles and the former can be quite disarming. Nor do I know whether Fawzi was speaking with the knowledge and authority of Nasser. I kept wondering during this conversation if he were under instructions to find out whether the United States did in fact have a peace plan it was contemplating trying to impose upon the area as has been charged here in recent critical articles. I do not believe this to be the case but this thought made me somewhat cautious. On the other hand one might speculate that the Egyptian Government is at last really getting concerned about the impression they have been giving the United States recently. This refers of course to their desire for continued and increased assistance from the United States. If one thinks in terms of normal Middle East suspicions and politics one might also conclude that, with the uncertainty here at present,Fawzi had decided he might benefit in the future personally by appearing reasonable in the US eyes.

There is just a chance, however, that this conversation could be the beginning of something important. The RCC has been forced to do a lot of thinking recently as to their place in the scheme of things and this has probably included a good deal of map gazing. How, they wonder, can Egypt serve as an important base area for a forward defense when there is no land connection between Egypt and that area? There is probably an increased awareness here that Egypt is in fact isolated geographically. Even Salah Salem, in his wild ravings, told me that the Israeli problem lay at the root of all the difficulties of organizing defense of the area. If a solution could be found to this problem which would reconnect Egypt to the forward area he thought everything else would fall in line.

All of our thinking on Alpha contemplated me dealing directly with Nasser only. If Nasser would however let Fawzi have a hand in this it could be a great advantage. While he might not be allowed any authority as regards decision, he is, on the other hand, a good technician and far more knowledgeable about many aspects of the general problem than Nasser is likely to be.

I plan to follow through on this discussion unless you see some reason why I should not. Perhaps next time I can find out whether he is speaking with Nasser’s authority. I wish to caution again, however, that this one conversation should not lead to great expectations in the Department. I am afraid the joint conclusions of Stevenson and I will still prove to be valid as regards getting very far at this time. I have told Stevenson of this conversation with Fawzi. He agrees that I should follow through on the matter but is not hopeful as to the results.

The other reason I am reporting this by letter is the question of secrecy. Three years in the Department on this subject has made me believe that it is impossible to keep the Israelis from finding out matters we are working on of real interest to them. I feel certain, for instance, that they know more about Alpha than we suspect. Such knowledge, in my opinion, could even have been one of the motives for the Gaza raid—although of course this is speculation.

Unless you and the Secretary disagree (and barring rapid developments that would make such a course unwise) I would prefer reporting on this subject by Top Secret letter. I would of course wish the Secretary to see such letters, or if overly long, a summary you might produce. Communications to him probably should be hand carried by Rod² or Johnny³ for reasons Jack⁴ can tell you about. All of this of course is for you to decide and I hope you do not think I have become overly cautious regarding secrecy. I just think the task itself will be well nigh impossible even without any unnecessary complications.

My deepest appreciation for the patience the Department has exhibited since my arrival here. I am certain there have been times when you felt like letting the whole area have a great blast of righteous US indignation. Patience, however, I believe is beginning to pay dividends and I am, in general, much less discouraged than even a week ago.

Sincerely,

Hank

[Enclosure]

Memorandum of a Conversation, American Embassy, Cairo, March 26, 1955⁵

I met this morning with Dr.Fawzi at the Foreign Ministry at his request. The meeting lasted an hour and ten minutes.

I opened the conversation by stating I would appreciate an expression of his general views about the current situation. I told him of my recent long talk with Nasser in which Salah Salem participated in part.⁶ I stated I hoped I had been able to erase some of the suspicions from Nasser’s mind but was certain I had failed as regards Salah Salem. There followed a general discussion in which Fawzi stressed the need for a calming down period. He had felt things were going in that direction until the brutally strong démarche by Turkey to Syria.⁷ This had only resulted in keeping emotions alive.

I asked if he felt Egypt’s draft for the proposed new arrangements with Saudi Arabia, Syria and Yemen would, in fact, contain language which would orient the pact as being hostile to defense arrangements in the north, and Iraq particularly. He replied that if we read the “whole document”, he thought we would not be too alarmed as a way would be left open for eventual cooperation between these new arrangements and those in the north. At one point he used the phrase, “if there is a pact at all”. I did not follow through on this subject because of the extremely interesting remarks he then volunteered on the subject of Israel.

Fawzi stated he believed some of the trends in the Middle East were becoming extremely dangerous and he felt that current frictions within the area must somehow be eased as quickly as possible. He listed these as: (1) Inter-Arab quarrels; (2) The Arab-Israeli problem; and (3) The recent renewal of old suspicions and hostility between Turkey and the bulk of the Arab World. He stated it must be a great source of satisfaction to Russia to watch these developments. To my surprise, he said he felt it an equal source of satisfaction for India. The motives of India, he said, might be different than those of the Kremlin but the end result turned out to be the same.

In the ensuing discussion Fawzi did not return to points 1 and 2 above but concentrated his remarks on the Arab-Israeli problem. He stated there were widely varying schools of thought as to when a real effort should be made to solve this problem. He personally was inclined to think that there was no time to lose. As far as Egypt was concerned there were two main problems, i.e., refugees and frontier rectifications.⁸ As regards refugees, he felt Egypt’s views more realistic than many of the Arab States. They realized that most refugees could not return to Israel and that there could not be compensation for any but material losses. The Egyptians of course wished that the total amount of such compensation would come out of Jewish pockets but they realized this was not practical. He felt Egypt could be brought to accept the concept that others would pay through Israel. As regards territory, he said he felt it imperative that a land link be re-established between Egypt and the rest of the Arab World. By this he was not speaking of merely a “corridor” as this would only provide another artificial ambush trap for the future. He did not know the size of the strip that should be considered but felt that it should swing up in an arc to include Gaza which could be ceded to Jordan. Gaza was only a liability to Egypt and she would be glad to get rid of it.

Fawzi stated he realized any politician in Israel would be hard put to accept such a solution but he felt it basically to be in Israel’s long term interests and it might help the position of their Government if they could say it was, in fact, imposed upon them. He realized as well that many Arab politicians were using the Palestine issue for their own personal advantage and this created a great problem. He felt that Lebanon and Libya probably felt about the same as Egypt. In the remaining Arab States there were only smaller circles who would be reasonable on the problem.

I asked Fawzi what he thought the United States could usefully do in this situation. I told him it had been a temptation during my four years of work on the Middle East to assemble our most able experts and work out what we felt to be the most practicable and acceptable solutions for each major specific problem in the Palestine question. The problem had always been what to do with such concrete views if we did make such an effort. What did he suggest the United States could do? He replied that probably the first point to be decided was whether the United States alone, the United States and other selected nations, or the United Nations itself should make the effort. He asked what were my views. I replied half jokingly I supposed the United States would get the blame in any event and then more seriously agreed that this was a problem to be studied.

Whatever his motive,Fawzi exhibited a sense of urgency that surprised me and his desire to continue the discussion seemed real. I told him something of the personal concern of the President and Secretary of State on this question. This included their general views as to the detriment to the entire area of this continuing feud, the difficulties it imposed upon constructive development and the building of strength in the area, and a bit of the domestic problems it caused for us at home. When I spoke of the personal conviction and political courage of our two leaders on this subject, he warmly indicated his agreement and expressed his great personal admiration.

I told him I was certain that both of these individuals would wish me to have extremely frank and quite secret talks on this subject here in Egypt. I did not know what decisions my Government would make as to the role it could play but knew they would welcome a thorough and frank exchange of ideas with Egypt prior to deciding what role, if any, the United States could play. If we proceeded in talks of this nature, I could assure him that for my part they would be in utmost secrecy. He agreed completely upon necessity for secrecy.

Fawzi then stated that we must find a way in which politicians on both sides of the armistice line could state there had been definite gains out of cooperation on this problem. His general thesis was that in order to be able to take such steps they would have to be able to point to specific, as contrasted to vague, examples of resultant benefits in their individual countries. In this he felt economic development assistance was of primary importance, with some military aid as well as necessity. I told him I of course without instructions on such specifics but it might be—if we reached that stage—I would be given authority on such matters.

We agreed to think over each others remarks and continue the conversation at a later date.

B

1. Source: Department of State,NEA Files: Lot 59 D 518, Alpha—memo, etc., beginning after return from London—Mar. 11 thru April 26. Top Secret; Alpha.
2. Roderic L. O’Connor, Special Assistant to the Secretary of State.
3. John W. Hanes, Jr., Special Assistant to the Secretary of State.
4. John D. Jernegan, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern, South Asian, and African Affairs.
5. Drafted by Byroade.

6. On March 20,Byroade informed the Department:

   “Yesterday Nasser invited me for unannounced and locally quite secret meeting with him today outside Cairo. Conversation, almost entirely on matters arising from defense organization, lasted 6 hours without interruption. Had set as my goal convincing Nasser unwisdom from Egypt’s point of view, of pursuing Saudi-Syria-Egyptian Pact. While am certain he convinced move unwise was unable devise with him any method by which proposed pact would be called off. He reiterated, almost in sadness, Egypt now too committed to change course and meetings for finalization would probably be soon.” (Telegram 1373 from Cairo; Department of State, Central Files, 611.74/3–2055)

7. Reference is to a Turkish aide-mémoire of March 13 to Syria; it objected to the provision in the March 2 Egyptian-Syrian communiqué pledging the two governments to refrain from joining the Turkish-Iraqi pact and charged that Syria was turning away from friendship with Turkey in favor of Egypt’s negativism and hostility. (Despatch 454 from Ankara, March 14;ibid., 674.83/3–1455)
8. Note:Fawzi chose to ignore the internal political problem which doing anything about Israel constitutes for the RCC. [Footnote in the source text.]