153. Memorandum From Robert Komer of the National Security Council Staff to President Johnson1
Pak reactions to consortium postponement. The Paks have apparently decided to take a tough line (perhaps to test how serious we are). After appeals to us not to postpone the consortium, Bhutto then announced our request2 (he expressed doubt that the US actually intended to cut off aid “or that it would dare do so even if it wanted to, in view of uniformly adverse and violent Afro-Asian reaction which could be expected.”)
The result is that the postponement has now become a public issue. McConaughy says “our position in Pakistan is rapidly assuming crisis proportions.”3 Ayub himself in a speech said Pakistan seeks “friends not masters” and that the US has been acting in a manner prejudicial to Pakistan’s interests in Indo/Pak disputes. It is not unusual, he said, that big powers become overbearing in their attitudes. The Pak press is taking this line.
Earlier, Bhutto gave McConaughy a tough time, saying that Pakistan not the US was really the injured party. Hence, we should come to them, not they to us.4 Then on 9 July Pak Ambassador Ahmed delivered a tough oral message to Rusk calling the postponement “ill-advised”; its “invidious nature” would not be lost on the Pak people.5
[Page 309]Rusk talked briefly with Ahmed today, but asked Ahmed to come back tomorrow, because he had to meet the Stevenson plane. Rusk’s main reason was that he wants to talk with you first. He and Talbot are deeply troubled that we’re approaching an open confrontation with the Paks, and are inclined to play it cautiously. Rusk emphasized to Ahmed that our Hill troubles were real, citing the conference deadlock as evidence of a deeper malaise. In answer to Ahmed’s question as to whether we still intended to make a pledge in September, Rusk told him this was our present intention.
We’re in for a rough ride, but there are even greater risks in backwatering in the face of the foolhardy Pak decision to create a public spat. Since we hold the better cards, we can afford to sit tight and keep quiet for a while longer, and see if they’ll come to us.6
- Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Memos to the President, McGeorge Bundy, Vol. 12, July 1965. Secret.↩
- Bhutto announced the U.S. decision to request a postponement of the Pakistan consortium meeting during a debate on foreign policy in the National Assembly on July 13. (Telegram 3 from Rawalpindi, July 13; National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1964–66, AID 9 PAK)↩
- McConaughy made this assessment in telegram 8 from Rawalpindi, July 15. He noted that through press articles and speeches the country was being aroused to unite behind the government’s resistance to alleged U.S. attempts to suborn Pakistani sovereignty and national pride. (Ibid.)↩
- McConaughy reported this July 12 conversation in telegram 2 from Rawalpindi, July 13. (Ibid.)↩
- See footnote 2, Document 146.↩
- Bundy added a handwritten note that reads: “strongly agree.”↩
- Bundy initialed below Komer’s signature.↩