Foreign Relations of the United States, 1977–1980, Volume XIX, South Asia

452. Minutes of a Policy Review Committee Meeting¹

Washington, July 22, 1980, 10:30 a.m.–noon

SUBJECT

• Minutes—PRC Meeting on Pakistan

PARTICIPANTS

• State

  • Secretary Edmund Muskie
  • Warren Christopher, Deputy Secretary
  • Harold Saunders, Ass’t. Secretary for Near Eastern & South Asian Affairs

• Defense

  • Ambassador Robert Komer, Under Secretary for Policy
  • Ambassador Robert Pelletreau, Deputy Ass’t. Secretary for Near Eastern, African, & South Asian Affairs

• Office of Management and Budget

  • John White, Assistant Director
  • Ed Sanders, Associate Director for International Affairs

• United Nations

  • Ambassador William Vandenheuvel, Deputy U.S. Representative to the U.N.

• Arms Control and Disarmament

  • Ralph Earle, Director
  • Spurgeon Keeny, Deputy Director

• Joint Chiefs of Staff

  • General Lew Allen, Acting Chairman-Chief of Staff for Air Force
  • Vice Adm. Thor Hanson, Director, Joint Staff

• Central Intelligence Agency

  • Admiral Stansfield Turner, Director
  • Robert Ames, NIO for Near East and South Asia
  • International Development Cooperation Agency
  • Guy Erb, Deputy Director
  • Frederick Schieck, Deputy Ass’t. Adm. for AID-Bureau of Asia

• White House

  • Zbigniew Brzezinski
  • David Aaron
  • Henry Owen

• National Security Council

  • William Odom
  • Thomas Thornton

Muskie: I would like to state several assumptions that I am making: 1. We have no immediate plans to increase our military assistance to Pakistan. We are restricted by the Symington Amendment, the Pakistanis do not have money available to buy equipment, and they are not interested in an FMS program of the size that we offered. 2. Pakistan needs economic assistance. We have agreed to move ahead on debt rescheduling and they have said that they want economic aid. 3. Defense and State should do more work on contingency planning and the possibility of sending military supplies on short notice. 4. Our response should be in terms of items that do not require Congressional consultation and also those that do. Based on these assumptions I would make several recommendations:

1—State and DOD refine the paper on intermediate level contingencies and diplomatic/military responses.²

2—DOD refine its planning on equipment availability and review its arrangements—with the goal of faster reaction time—for a short notice military supply operation.

3—The Secretary of State reaffirm to Shahi, during his visit to Washington next week, our willingness to discuss intermediate level contingencies whenever they wish to do so.

4—Ambassador West be instructed to ask the Saudis the status of the Saudi/Gulf states assistance package for Pakistan.

These proposals are not related to the ultimate horror story; they reflect a conservative estimate of what may happen in the post-Olympic period.

Brzezinski: The third point that you make is the most important one. Please enlarge on it.

Muskie: If Agha Shahi says yes we would come back here to review on the basis of that what they want. We assume that they do not want to pursue a military dialog. What I am trying to do is to put the ball in their court.

Brzezinski: I agree with both your analysis of the situation and the tactics you propose. The Pakistanis prefer to have the Islamic nations up front. But since this is the key to strengthen their confidence in us, how would we respond if Shahi agrees?

Muskie: If he responds in a significant way we (the PRC) would review the problems involved.

Brzezinski: Would we offer a team from State and Defense to meet covertly with the Pakistanis, or would we have an open dialogue?

Muskie: I just intend to show a willingness to listen without encouraging them. If Shahi is positive I would only say that we would review the issue.

Brzezinski: But what do we envision ourselves?

Muskie: I would state my third point as finding out if the Pakistanis are really thinking of a military relationship, and if so when, and what level.

Komer: But if Shahi is specific in what he wants, what do we think ourselves? Where does the road lead?

Brzezinski: When Warren Christopher and I were in Pakistan we were asked about how we would respond to various levels of contingencies. We said that in case of a massive attack the 1959 Agreement would come into effect. In the case of more limited attacks the Pakistanis would handle it themselves but we could supply military equipment. We were generally quite vague.³ Your third point is extremely important. It gives Pakistan the feeling that they can talk to us. But we should decide soon how we would structure ourselves for such a discussion. Should Saunders and McGiffert go to Pakistan? What kind of a response do we have in mind?

Muskie: The more we discuss my third point the less enthusiastic I become about it. Shahi is coming here to talk about the Islamic Conference,⁴ not Afghanistan. I see this as an incidental question to be raised to get a view of their position, but not to encourage them.

Christopher: Based on my past experience I would say that if they do pick up our offer we should do it in the most inconspicuous way possible and reduce any expectations. If the Secretary of State were to go to Pakistan to talk to Zia you could risk a confrontation. We should handle this at a lower level to see if their request would be realistic.

Muskie: Will they respond to this?

Brzezinski: Probably not initially, but perhaps if the situation heated up.

Muskie: Well that possibility exists anyway. It would be interesting to get their estimate of danger of Soviet pressure and their judgment whether they can contain it.

Komer: Zia and the Pakistani military are the key actors in this. They are more interested in this sort of planning than is Shahi.

Saunders: Last week we raised the possibility of Hummel talking to Zia while Shahi is here in the United States.

Muskie: I do not intend to raise the matter unless Shahi does.

Komer: I agreed with you (Muskie) until you explained what you have in mind. I agree that this is a time-buying exercise. We are talking today about the same issue we discussed at our last meeting.⁵ We are embarking on a risky road and the odds would be against us militarily if we confronted the Pakistanis in this part of the world. If so, do we not want to take steps to prevent escalation as was discussed last time? I question your first three or four assumptions, especially since they are based on the idea that the Pakistanis know what they are doing. I don’t think they do. The Pakistanis are not completely without money. They would like to buy military equipment from us and will probably get Saudi money to do so.

The Pakistani military is more nervous about the Soviets than is Agha Shahi. The Pakistanis are in over their heads and they are inching our way. We have gotten conflicting signals since January but these have become increasingly positive, especially in the intelligence channels. I don’t think we can make a firm decision now on how far we would go in the way that Brzezinski’s logic takes us. As I said last time I would like to see us work the Indian side of the street. Nine of the fourteen Pakistani divisions are facing India. The Pakistanis want to equip the other five and when they do so this will make problems for India. It would make a lot of difference if they could divert some of their divisions on the Indian front to the Afghan front. We could talk with Indira Gandhi and should. We cannot ignore India as we try to deal with South Asia. This is something that I learned in the Johnson Administration. The Indians do not want to see the Soviets in the subcontinent and they do not want to confront the Soviets over a divided Pakistan. If India were to pull back its forces the Pakistanis might shift some of theirs away from India and move them to the Western front. This is of course easy to articulate but very hard to put into effect.

Saunders: This is a good objective over time but is not likely to be achieved in the next month or so. Agha Shahi did discuss this with Indira Gandhi.⁶

Brzezinski: I agree that it is desirable but the payoff will not come quickly. It will not solve our short-term problem which involves a possible Soviet effort in Afghanistan which falls short because of Afghan resistance and then spills over into Pakistan. If the Soviets were to attack Pakistan we will have to do a lot more than we are ready to and want to do now. Think, if we had met in mid-December we would not have come up with one-third of the list of things that we finally did after the Soviets attacked. The most important thing to do is to deter Soviet action. We will save trouble later by doing this now. We want to give the Pakistanis confidence that we are there, and in some subtle fashion, we want to convey to the Soviets that we would not be indifferent to pressure on Pakistan. We just would give some indicators.

If the Pakistanis decide they want to talk to us about security cooperation the Soviets will come to know it.

Komer: That also argues for Zbig’s point. Harold Brown does not want to send ground forces into Pakistan; therefore he wants to minimize the likelihood of Soviet attack.

Muskie: We should do the minimum that we can without blowing things up. What I have suggested is modest.

Brzezinski: I would add to your list that you or the President should talk to Senator Byrd and ask him to give some thought to this Pakistan question.

Muskie: The President talked to Byrd about the rescue mission the day before it happened but without letting him know that it was underway.⁷ Byrd was burned badly on that. He will not hold this sort of thing close; he will suggest that we talk to Stennis and Church. Some of the people he will talk to could get very uptight. Byrd will also think that, in light of his Iran experience, more is going on than he is being told about. I am trying to put us in a position to anticipate the more conservative CIA estimate of the danger and come to know what the Pakistanis and the Saudis may intend. We can position ourselves by doing these four things. This obviates the need of going to Congress at this point.

Vandenheuvel: Komer’s suggestion is worth further consideration and it wouldn’t cost us anything. Could the initiative to the Indians come from another source?

Muskie: The Indians may not be too receptive at this point in view of the Tarapur situation.⁸ Anyway, if the Indians understand the realities of the situation they may well do it on their own.

Komer: You cannot assume that.

Muskie: Let us wait until after the Tarapur issue is over.

Vandenheuvel: Perhaps somebody else could take the initiative.

Komer: The British?

Saunders: We will have to think about who could best do it.

Komer: I have a very personal interest in this since I hope to go to Delhi and would like to be the bearer of the news to Mrs. Gandhi.⁹ Returning to the fourth point of Secretary Muskie’s, we have prepared a paper with three illustrative, quite modest packages.¹⁰ They add up to $52, $111, and $226 million respectively. This would not be a major financial problem and the equipment could be moved rapidly. It is all old equipment except for perhaps some C–130s. We should tell the Saudis that we have this ready for quick sale. We will be happy to sell it to the Pakistanis and they should tell the Pakistanis that.

Brzezinski: Are you going to tell the Pakistanis the price on the F–15?

Komer: No, let them get that from McDonald-Douglas. We could sell them for instance 1,000 TOWs. We could encourage Pakistan to accept these as a positive gesture. We could dribble this out slowly over time so that we don’t even have to approach Congress for the sales. We can also accelerate the TOWs and add some launchers and perhaps some LAWs. This would enable us to make some positive gestures in the military cash sales area and these would be big enough to register in both Moscow and Delhi.

Christopher: You had best be careful in how you approach the idea to the Saudis. They know in any event that we are ready to continue our cash sales policy.

Komer: I find that you have to tell the Saudis everything at least 7 times.

In any case the acceleration of deliveries is a separate issue from the approach to the Saudis.

Brzezinski: In effect then you are adding to the fourth point that we are willing to accelerate sales and you’re adding a new fifth point to tell Pakistan that it would be in their interest to buy certain types of weapons.

Turner: That relates to the question of deterrence.

Most of what we do won’t have a deterrent impact.

Muskie: It is implicit in point number four that we are willing to sell to Pakistan. We will tell them that the arms are available. Your fifth point assumes an answer to number three. Should we not get that answer first?

Komer: No, these should be treated as entirely separate. The contingency discussion in your third point is separate from the question of arms sales.

Muskie: What is the nature of Pakistan’s sensitivity?

Aaron: They want to stick with the Islamic relationship.

Komer: That was the rationalization after the event last January.¹¹ Zia was simply mad at the size of the package we offered.

Saunders: A big US assistance package is different from cash sales.

Turner: They simply saw the risks as outweighing the benefits in accepting our offer.

Komer: They overplayed their hand. I wanted to separate the aid relationship from the discussion in the third point.

Muskie: I’m interested to see if they are ready for an open arms relationship. Have we changed their minds since last January? Also, remember that the Pakistanis were rude to Congress—as Congress sees it. We don’t want to tell Congress that we went and solicited them; we want to be able to tell Congress that the Pakistanis have changed since January.

Komer: I assumed in your list that “limited contingencies,” meant action on the ground.

Christopher: Let us strike those words and substitute, “their interest in a possible arms relationship.”

Muskie: Instead of an Indian initiative as number five, I suggest that the Minutes of this meeting show that the matter has been raised and we discussed both the need for greater Indian concern and the possibility of raising the troop withdrawal issue¹² with them. We will explore but we do not have any specific ideas at this point. Is there any further discussion?

Turner: Have we addressed the fundamental issue? Is this a policy which will buttress the Pakistanis to encourage the insurgency? We could do more now with the Congressional involvement. The Pakistanis are telling us that food is becoming a major problem for the insurgents; we could supply that either overtly or covertly. We could also undertake either a covert or overt propaganda campaign to publicize the Soviet incursions that have taken place this far as a form of deterrence. There are also other covert possibilities that I would prefer to discuss privately.

Saunders: The Pakistanis have preferred to keep the incursions quiet.

Aaron: I don’t want to see the idea of contingency planning dropped. Could we develop a joint assessment with the Pakistanis of the existing risk? We could do this through the intelligence channels. This might tell us how they view the incursions and whether they would want to go ahead with contingency planning.

Turner: Yes, we can do that.

Aaron: This would show them that we care and that we are thinking ahead.

Muskie: Would that not raise the same kind of problems we’ve been discussing?

Turner: We can do it and indeed have been discussing it with them. But we can make it more formal by sending me out or Carlucci.

Muskie: That sounds like a sensible idea.

Saunders: We could add that to the first of Secretary Muskie’s four points.

Komer: Yes, add “and request formal joint assessment of the threat from Pakistan.”

Turner: We will tell them that we are concerned about the post-Olympic situation.

Aaron: This would lead directly from their request for military equipment which they made through other channels.

Muskie: Have they made such a request already? (Secretary was informed of the proceedings of a previous meeting.)¹³

Allen: Militarily, the longer the Soviets are embroiled with the Afghan rebels the more time we will have to get things done. We should do all we can to increase the insurgents capabilities.

Komer: Should we not decide to accelerate the military sales pipeline and plan for that—for instance the TOWs that they have already bought and paid for and are scheduled for delivery in 1982 could be moved up for delivery in the third or fourth quarter of this year. This would however mean diverting from other customers such as Korea and Israel or from US active duty inventories. Would you want to do that? It will cause a lot of trouble with my clients but we would not need to notify Congress.

Muskie: Let us wait until we have finished the exercise that I have suggested. I am meeting with Shahi tomorrow. State and DOD should have their papers written before the end of the week.

White: Before you talk to anybody make sure that we are indeed able to accelerate deliveries and will not run into insuperable difficulties within our government. You should not be in a position to offer something that you cannot do.

Muskie: Let’s look at everything that we are in a position to do. The problem is the other customers. What about food? Can we get food to Afghanistan?

Turner: We have to get it to the refugee camps. (A confused discussion of PL–480 ensued.)

Muskie: Let us look into the food question. We would have to handle a large food program either through reprogramming or by going to Congress for additional resources.

Aaron: Also, we need to know where the shortages are appearing geographically. If they are spread throughout the country, perhaps other countries could help by sending food through Iran.

Turner: We will look into that.

Muskie: Let us have all of that ready for a meeting late next week.

1. Source: Carter Library, National Security Council, Institutional Files, Box 81, PRC 145, 7/22/80, Pakistan. Secret. The meeting took place in the White House Situation Room.
2. Not found.
3. See Document 423.
4. Reference is presumably to a reported statement by Shahi that the Islamic Conference Standing Committee on the Afghan crisis planned to call an international conference on the crisis, potentially to include the United States, among other countries. In telegram 188526 to Islamabad, July 17, the Department requested more information on Shahi’s statements. (National Archives, RG 59, Central Foreign Policy File, D800344–0713) The Committee was established by a resolution adopted at the Conference of Islamic Foreign Ministers held in Islamabad May 17–22. The resolution also condemned the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. (Marvine Howe, “Islamic Conference Ends; Afghanistan Talks Proposed,” New York Times, May 23, 1980, p. A10)
5. See Document 451.
6. Shahi met with Gandhi on July 15. (Telegram 14997 from New Delhi, July 16; National Archives, RG 59, Central Foreign Policy File, D800341–0818) He also met with Foreign Minister Rao. See footnote 3, Document 191.
7. According to the President’s Daily Diary, Carter met with Byrd at 7:49 p.m. on April 23 in the Oval Office. (Carter Library, Presidential Materials)
8. See footnotes 2 and 3, Document 196.
9. See footnote 2, Document 206.
10. Not found
11. Reference is to the Pakistani rejection of the U.S. aid offer. See Documents 407 and 408.
12. Not further identified.
13. Reference is to the July 7 SCC(I) meeting. See Document 449.