Nixon's 'Jewish Portfolio'

...How far they can go in dealing directly with President Nixon on basic policy, bypassing what they have come to regard as a hostile State Department...

...Washington-USA NIXON'S 'JEWISH PORTFOLIO' BY ANDREW J. GLASS Washington In the summer of 1968, when Lyndon Johnson came under pressure from the Israelis to ship them Phantom jets, he flew to the LBJ ranch to assess the Middle East situation and reach a decision There he resolved to give the Israelis their warplanes, but only through the placing of a new production order, a procedure that effectively delayed the start of Phantom deliveries well into the following year The President also cautioned the Israeli diplomats whom he had invited to Texas that he would regard any leak by their government of his secret commitment as a clear sign that Israel really did not want the planes after all The idea was for the President to leak word of the impending Phantom sale to the Russians himself, which he did, framing his note m a way calculated to make Moscow think twice about the necessity of its own scheduled arms shipments to Egypt Had the Soviets taken the hint, there would have been time enough to show the Israelis how brilliant U S diplomacy had preserved their security while saving them hundreds of millions of dollars in unneeded aircraft...

...The Phantom contract ran out three months ago, and the Israelis have just capped their campaign for a resumption of deliveries with a Washington visit by Prime Minister Golda Meir Her two-week stay in the US, though, proved that the Phantoms are only one piece of a complex diplomatic puzzle Certainly the Israelis would like more Phantoms But they are even more concerned about...

...The Nixon-Kissinger-Rogers relationship is a subtle one and not without its ironies Rogers remains one of Nixon's closest friends He stood with him when most people thought Nixon was finished politically The President, in turn, admires not only his loyalty but also a certain Rogers polish he has never been able to attain Yet since assuming the Presidency, Nixon has relied far more heavily on the counsel of Kissinger and the National Security Council staff than he has on his old friend Bill Rogers and the top officials of the State Department...

...With the superpowers diverted by the Indo-Pakistani war and, according to Egyptian President Anwar el-Sadat, time running out on the cease-fire, the danger of renewed fighting in the Sinai has increased Yet neither the situation in Asia nor fear of Sadat's threats brought Mrs Meir to Washington The Israelis have felt all along that they could hold their own, even without additional Phantoms, provided the Russians did not take an active part in any fighting...

...Nixon sought to resolve this all too human dilemma by sounding Rogers out on the possibility of accepting a seat on the Supreme Court the last time a vacancy occurred But Rogers is no more interested in becoming a jurist than he is m running the State Department, a task he delegates to career underlings More than anything else, he is eager to bring about a peace settlement m the Middle East through the acceptance of one or another "Rogers Plan...

...Richard Nixon has given the State Department more latitude on the Middle East than any other recent President, although with Mrs Meir he dealt from his own deck American Presidents from Roosevelt through Johnson have traditionally assigned White House staff men to what is known as the "Jewish portfolio " This was done on the assumption that the State Department, with its flock of career Arabists, is inherently biased against the Israeli position as well as inherently unmindful of the key role Jews play in American politics, both as major financial contributors and swing-state voters Nixon, however, acts as his own staff man for the Middle East...

...The curious part of all this is that Nixon is far less dependent than his two predecessors on Jewish political contributions and even, in the final analysis, on Jewish votes So, while the President remains personally friendly to the Israeli cause, he retains a freedom of action no other principal player in the Middle East drama seems to possess This independence is likely to keep the Israeli side apprehensive about Richard Nixon throughout 1972...

...Until the latest series of talks, Israeli leaders have been more or less candid with Rogers and his rnde-pendent-mmded assistant, Joseph Sisco In return for this frankness, they complain, Rogers and Sisco (who often do not agree) have taken Israel's minimum demands as prior concessions and then tried to wring further concessions Not surprisingly, Sadat currently feels the same way about Rogers and Sisco??which is why the US peace initiative in the Middle East is getting nowhere By late November the Israelis, faced with the prospect of another frustrating round of debate at the United Nations, felt they had come to the point where they had to turn directly to the President for support From all accounts, Nixon told Mrs Meir exactly what she wanted to hear that the U S would back her government in a showdown, just as the Russians could be expected to back Sadat??no matter how many more "even-handed" pronouncements emanate from the State Department...

...Ambassador Rabin??a military type who gets along well with Nixon's military advisers??flew back to Jerusalem to report the Prime Minister's conclusions to the Cabinet Meantime, Mrs Meir remained behind for another 10 days in New York and Washington, making her way quietly though a labyrinth of luncheons and dinners with leading American newspaper and magazine publishers, their top editors, columnists, and broadcasting executives These off-the-record sessions were aimed at putting the best face on Israeli policy But, as in her news conferences, Mrs Meir chose not to emphasize the fact that, Phantoms aside, Nixon has been more generous than Presidents Kennedy or Johnson in (quietly) supplying the Israelis with all sorts of sophisticated armaments...

...How to keep American public opinion from turning against them during what promises to be an elusive search for a lasting peace settlement...

...Perhaps after he receives the Nobel Peace Prize for the Rogers Plan, he'll want to go to the Supreme Court," a sharp-tongued White House observer said to me Another analyst, who used to work in the Johnson White House, remarked "Rogers has this passion for reopening the Suez Canal The Joint Chiefs of Staff go up in smoke every time they even think about it...

...How to dissuade the President from making a deal behind their backs m Moscow next May...

...There are two main theories why the President's trusted national security adviser, Henry Kissinger, has chosen to maintain the lowest of profiles in the area The more popular one is that since Kissinger is Jewish, his judgments would lack credibility, at least with the Arab side But people who have long dealt with him say they have never known him to be inhibited in the slightest over any aspect of foreign policy A more arcane theory is that Kissinger has stayed out of the Middle East picture (except, of course, m confidential talks with his boss) simply to leave Secretary of State William P Rogers some world area of primary importance...

...In short, since the Phantoms were too hot an item for a Nixon-Men accord, they turned to other vital matters The upshot was that Mrs Meir left the White House assured, after a two-hour tete-a-tete with the President, that his Kremlin talks would not endanger Israel's interests, and that her nation would continue to receive whatever military hardware (except Phantoms) it could use All m all, the Israelis seemed satisfied with the Nixon approach...

...This estimate is shared by the Pentagon and the Central Intelligence Agency, where Israeli military prowess is much more admired than is Israeli diplomacy at the State Department And as long as the President's analysts inform him that the Israelis have nothing to worry about in a new Arab conflict, he will remain reluctant to supply more Phantoms The White House views these planes as more than a weapons system able to hold its own against MIG 23s in desert skies because, for all concerned, they are a political symbol too...

...From the Israeli point of view, resumption of Phantom deliveries would be a welcome signal that Nixon intends to stand behind their interests From the Arab standpoint, new sales would reveal that a pro-Israeh bloc of financiers and politicians had finally reached the President's ear and that, consequently, any fresh U S effort to mediate m the area was highly suspect The Soviet Union, which currently favors a Middle East detente??of only to allow its warships to steam through the Suez Canal to the Indian Ocean ??could most likely respond by selling Sadat a further quantity of up-to-date missiles and jets...

...For that matter, Prime Minister Meir, Foreign Minister Abba Eban and Ambassador Yitzhak Rabin are apt to go up in smoke whenever they deal with Rogers For some time, the Israelis have been distrustful of his peace initiatives, if only because no one in the Soviet government was dedicating himself to winning a peace prize by persuading the Arabs to be reasonable To further complicate matters, the Israel-Rogers relationship has lately taken on a new and nasty wrinkle Although Mrs Meir emerged from her three-hour session with the secretary to proclaim to the press that their meeting had been "wonderful,' in subsequent private comments she questioned both his judgment and his intellectual capacity...