Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume XXIV, Middle East Region and Arabian Peninsula, 1969–1972; Jordan, September 1970

298. Transcript of a Telephone Conversation Between the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger) and the President’s Deputy Assistant for National Security Affairs (Haig)¹

Washington, September 21, 1970, about 7:30 a.m.

K: Al, I think you ought to call Rabin. Or should I do it?

H: No, I can do it.

K: And tell him this is a matter of such importance that we have decided to get the senior people together so that they could be sure that they had a united government backing them.

H: Yes.

K: Put it in a positive way.

H: Absolutely.

K: And that I have asked you to communicate that to him.

H: Right.

K: And that otherwise we didn’t want to go through the Cambodian exercise again.

H: Right.

K: So that the meeting is at 8:30 and they won’t get the answer much before 10:00.

H: Okay, sir. I think that is alright. He said they would hope to have an answer in two or three hours so we will make it alright.

K: We won’t make it because he called you at 5:00 am.

H: Yes.

K: They will decide not to decide.

H: Well, that could happen but—

K: Let him hear his goddamned Secretary of State. I have called Laird and Rogers² and that is aboard.

H: Good. Everyone else is being called right now.

K: Now do something about Moorer for Christ’s sake. And tell him this is the goddamned ball game. We are going to be dead. This is worse than Cambodia.

H: Oh, by far. Especially in the light of the other thing.

K: We will be dead—if we decide to do nothing and the Israelis go, we will be worse off. The only hope we have of preventing a disaster is to let them go and be tough as nails.

H: That’s right.

K: If there is a collapse and the Israelis do not go and then our world position is finished because they will be finished, don’t you think?

H: Right. Oh, I think they’ll go. They know in their own minds they have a couple of days because they can clean that thing out. So I’m not too concerned about that.

K: Frankly, I think they want the King to fall and then they will clean it up.

H: Yes. They want it to deteriorate a little more. And I think in either event they have control of that no matter what position we take.

K: Right.

H: Okay.

K: Okay. I’ll get a car. What time is it?

H: It is about 7:10.

K: Okay, I will come in as quickly as possible and I suppose you will too.

H: Yes.

K: Good. But talk to Robbie,³ will you?

H: Yes.

K: I don’t know what I’d do without you. We will be snapping at each other all afternoon we’ll be so tired.

H: Chuckle.

K: Except that we don’t snap on big things. It takes little ones.

H: Right.

K: Okay. Goodbye.

1. Source: National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, Kissinger Telephone Conversations, Box 30, Chronological Files. No classification marking. The time is handwritten.
2. See Documents 295 and 296.
3. Not further identified.