146. Memorandum From Robert Komer of the National Security Council Staff to the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy)1
Mac—
Paks are continuing their one-upmanship on consortium postponement.
G. Ahmed braced Rusk this noon with attached bristling “oral message from his government”2 (no doubt drafted by brother Aziz and Bhutto). In effect it says stop trying to push us.
When Rusk pleaded Congressional problems, G. Ahmed brusquely told him everything was fine on Capitol Hill. He told Talbot after the session that “this game is not worth the candle” and that this was the first time in the history of US/Pak relationship that economic aid had been used for political purposes.
I’m sure State is quivering but I hope that President will insist on simply staring the Paks down. The State experts’ hunch and mine is that the Paks are probing to see how far they can rock us. Since one can’t return an oral note, I hope we’ll give the Paks the silent treatment. They have to come to us in the last analysis.
- Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Pakistan, Vol. III, Memos, 12/64–7/65. Secret.↩
- Ahmed’s meeting with Rusk was reported to Karachi in telegram 51, July 10. (National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1964–66, AID 9 PAK) The text of the oral message, a copy of which Ahmed left with Rusk, was repeated to Karachi in telegram 44, July 9. The message stated that the Ayub government considered the U.S. proposal ill-advised. The proposed postponement of the consortium meeting was described as invidious and motivated by political rather than economic grounds. The fact that the Pakistan consortium was being postponed and the Indian consortium was not was bound to inflame public opinion in Pakistan, the message warned. (Ibid.)↩