271. Letter From the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy) to the President’s Special Representative and Adviser on African, Asian, and Latin American Affairs (Bowles)0
Dear Chet: I much enjoyed scanning your remarks to the American Jewish Congress.1 We need all the missionary work of this sort we can get. I’m also encouraged by your feeling that with careful handling and frank explanations we should not run into any unmanageable domestic political difficulties over our evolving policy toward Nasser.
Inviting him now, however, even for a visit after the 1962 elections, I think might seem rather premature at this stage. Mike Feldman and Bob Komer both react the same way I do.
We’ve already given Nasser enough bait, as a result of the Kaissouni visit, to hold him for awhile. Immediately after having promised him more PL-480, some $20–30 million in stabilization credits, and a favorable reception to about $51 million of development loans, should we rush in with yet another plum? Nasser himself probably doesn’t expect any more of us at this moment, so I question whether we should throw away so quickly one of our hole cards which may come in quite handy later.
Instead it seems to me that now is the time to sit back and wait for some responsive behavior on Nasser’s part over the next few months, before proceeding to what most of us would regard as the culmination of a major political initiative. To keep Nasser dangling a bit longer about a visit might be an added inducement to good behavior on his part. Moreover, with Israeli feelings, and those of the American Jewish community, rather bruised at this moment over the Tiberias affair, a Nasser invitation now might create quite a political backlash.
However, I have a completely open mind about an invitation at the right moment, and I believe this is also the President’s view. All in all, I think that our policy toward Nasser is evolving at a pretty fast clip, but it has been mostly a US effort so far. The President would probably want to see a little more of the color of Nasser’s money before he sat down to play face-to-face poker with him.
Sincerely,
- Source: Department of State, Central Files, 611.86B/5–1262. Secret.↩
- Attached to Bowles’ May 3 letter, Document 264.↩