Widlanski Commenting On Kissinger Document

2006-05-28

Dear Dr. Lerner,

You recently published notification to your readers of archival documents showing promises to Iraqi officials in 1975, www.imra.org.il/story.php3?id=29418 and I wanted to add something for the benefit of IMRA'S subscribers.

Henry Kissinger's promises to Iraqi officials to reduce Israel's size and power to "historical proportions" were made in December 1975--only a few months (September 1, 1975) after then-Secretary of State Kissinger and then-President Gerald Ford had signed several secret documents promising just the opposite to Israel.

Ford sent a secret letter to Yitzhak Rabin (then Israel's prime minister)[IMRA: text below], while Kissinger signed at least one memorandum of understanding, both promising additional military aid to Israel as well as positive treatment of Israel's retaining the Golan Heights.

The Ford letter and Kissinger memorandum (made to Israeli Foreign Minister Yigal Allon) can be found in my book "Can Israel Survive A Palestinian State?", IASPS, 1990. They were given as a way of getting Israel to agree to staged withdrawals in Sinai and next door to Damascus in 1975-76.

The newly found Kissinger-Iraqi document raises once again the issue of just how valid is a promise of support from an American president or American secretary of state.

In the Kissinger-Ford-Rabin-Allon correspondence of September 1975 there was also a promise that the US would not make general proposals for a Middle East settlement without getting Israel's approval. Exactly seven years later, Ronald Reagan issued his famous Reagan Plan on September 1,1982--without consulting Israel in advance.

Sincerely, (Dr.) Michael Widlanski

Letter from President Ford to Prime Minister Rabin September 1, 1975

SECRET

His Excellency Yitzhak Rabin Prime Minister of Israel

Dear Mr. Prime Minister:

I wish to inform you that the U.S. recognizes that the Israeli-Egyptian Interim Agreement entailing withdrawal from vital areas in the Sinai constitutes an act of great significance on Israel's part in the pursuit of final peace and imposes additional heavy military and economic burdens on Israel.

I want to assure you that the U.S. will make every effort to be fully responsive within the limits of its resources and Congressional authorization and appropriation on an ongoing and long-term basis to Israel's military equipment and other defense requirements as well as to Israel's economic aid needs, all of this based on the requests submitted by Israel, joint studies and previous U.S. Presidential undertakings.

Further to those undertakings, it is my resolve to continue to maintain Israel's defensive strength through the supply of advanced types of equipment, such as the F-16 aircraft. The United States Government agrees to an early meeting to undertake a joint study of high technology and sophisticated items, including the Pershing ground-to-ground missiles with conventional warheads, with the view to giving a positive response. The U.S. Administration will submit annually for approval by the U.S. Congress a request for military and economic assistance in order to help meet Israel's economic and military needs. Realizing as I do the importance of the Interim Agreement to the Middle Eastern situation as a whole, the U.S. will make every possible effort to assist in the establishment of conditions in which the Agreement will be observed without being subjected to pressures or deadlines.

In the spirit of the special relationship existing between the United States and Israel and in light of the determination of both sides to avoid a situation in which the U.S. and Israel would pursue divergent courses in peace negotiations, the U.S. will take the position that these are negotiations between the parties. As I indicated to you in our conversation on 12 June 1975, the situation in the aftermath of the Israeli-Egyptian Interim Agreement will be one in which the overall settlement can be pursued in a systematic and deliberate way and does not require the U.S. to put forward an overall proposal of its own in such circumstances. Should the U.S. desire in the future to put forward proposals of its own, it will make every effort to coordinate with Israel its proposals with a view to refraining from putting forth proposals that Israel would consider unsatisfactory.

The U.S. will support the position that an overall settlement with Syria in the framework of a peace agreement must assure Israel's security from attack from the Golan Heights. The U.S. further supports the position that a just and lasting peace, which remains our objective, must be acceptable to both sides. The U.S. has not developed a final position on the borders. Should it do so it will give great weight to Israel's position that any peace agreement with Syria must be predicated on Israel remaining on the Golan Heights. My view in this regard was stated in our conversation of September 13, 1974.

Sincerely, Gerald R. Ford

The text comes from Michael Widlanski, ed., Can Israel Survive a Palestinian State? (Jerusalem: Institute for Advanced Strategic Political Studies, 1990), pp. 120-21.

www.brook.edu/dybdocroot/ press/appendix/ appen_c.htm

Source: IMRA – Independent Media Review and Analysis