790D.5 MSP/4–954
No. 208
The Deputy Assistant Secretary of
State for Near Eastern, South Asian, and African Affairs
(Jernegan) to the Ambassador in Pakistan (Hildreth)1
official-informal
Dear Mr. Ambassador: In our message No. 883, April 162 we provided you just about all the data on the scope and intention of the Pakistan arms program it is possible to clear at this time on an official basis. I hope you will find it useful in clearing up some of the confusion which was generated by the statements as well, apparently, as by the unspoken attitude of the members of General Meyers’ survey team. In addition to the material included in that message I feel we owe you a personal explanation of some of the off-the-record factors which contributed to this confusing situation. I am accordingly writing you this letter for your confidential information in the hope that it will provide some measure of reassurance that confused as the situation in Washington may be, it has not fallen into the state of utter contradiction which recent official communications might seem to indicate.
The first element to take into account in attempting to understand the Pakistan aid problem is the fact that the nature and importance of United States strategic interests in the general area of the Middle East and South Asia has been defined in only vague and general terms. As a consequence, the amount of the investment justified to protect these interests is a matter which is certain to produce considerable debate but has as yet led to no agreed conclusion. It can be said that over the past several years there has been a sort of glacial movement toward the acceptance of increased United States responsibility in the area. The movement has been so gradual, however, as to be almost imperceptible and it has taken place largely without benefit of conscious guidance and impulse. By and large the State Department has been convinced that the logic of events compelled this development and that this should be recognized as a basis of policy. The Pentagon, on the other hand, feeling that available United States forces and resources were inadequate for this additional undertaking on top of our many other commitments around the world have consistently fought shy of this conclusion. [Page 501] A complete reconciliation of these inconsistencies has not yet been achieved.
This was the somewhat confused backdrop against which the decision to supply aid to Pakistan was taken. The inconsistencies were not first resolved, and are not even now, but I believe by that act we moved closer to such a resolution. As you know, this was in every sense a “high-level” decision in which the President, Secretaries of State and Defense, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff concurred. The whole problem had been raised to that level almost from the beginning by virtue of the importance of the Indian aspect of the matter, as well as by the successful promotional activities of General Ayub and Ghulam Mohammed. On the other hand, the question was never referred to the NSC with all of the prolonged staff work and the extensive circulation of drafts this would have involved.
When the decision was finally reached, I believe there was full recognition on the part of those making it of the need to carry through on a significant basis. We have reports that the President himself is of this mind and we know that Admiral Radford is strongly of this opinion. At the operating level in the Pentagon, however, where the terms of reference for the survey team were drafted—in the Office of Military Assistance and G-3 of the Army—it is doubtful that these views were known. Instead of reflecting the current views of the President, the Secretaries and Admiral Radford, the terms of reference reflected the long-standing uncertainty as to strategic objectives described above, as well as the general philosophy of “economize and cut-back” which has been constantly dinned into all levels of Pentagon personnel.
We saw the terms of reference in draft form and made a number of suggestions for modification, including clear directions to the team to prepare a long-term as well as an initial one-year program. When some of our officers went over to the Pentagon to brief the team the day before General Meyers departed from Washington, they discovered that not only had there been no such amendment in the terms of reference, but that General Meyers had become so infected with the philosophy of caution and doubt the terms of reference seemed to reflect that he was talking an extremely alarming line which he planned to take with the Pakistanis. On the basis of the report our officers brought back, Byroade arranged the next morning a meeting with Admiral Davis, the Director of the Office of Foreign Military Affairs in Defense, and General Stewart, the Director of the Office of Military Assistance, which was attended by a liberal sprinkling of Defense officials and by General Meyers.
In this meeting, it was demonstrated that at Admiral Davis’s level there was no lack of intention to carry through, and he clearly and emphatically told General Meyers that the Pakistan program was [Page 502] not to be regarded as a “one-shot” operation. He said the team should report long-range objectives as well as a detailed initial one-year program and stated that if General Meyers felt his terms of reference inhibited the submission of such a report, he, Admiral Davis, would change the terms of reference forthwith. General Meyers thereupon professed complete satisfaction with these statements and volunteered that since there was general agreement on Admiral Davis’s interpretation of his mission he would proceed on that basis. He said further, that in view of the general agreement indicated, he did not feel that any alteration in the terms of reference was necessary. We returned from this meeting feeling that General Meyers understood the position and that the survey would proceed on the right basis and with the proper intent.
Accordingly we were not only disturbed but considerably perplexed when the returns from Karachi began to come in. I do not profess to understand the actions and statement of General Meyers. As described by the Embassy, they were completely at variance with the explicit understanding reached at our meeting.3
With your telegram No. 8204 as a point of departure we moved as quickly as we could to clear the statement which reached you in our telegram No. 883. Although this message represents the limit of what we can say at present, we recognize that it will be desirable to have a more nearly definitive statement of long range objectives. As we stated in our telegram we think a good time to seek this will be shortly after the survey team report has been submitted. It may still be impossible to secure a statement as clear cut as we would like, but the glacier is moving. I have no doubts personally that we will be able to follow through with the Pakistan program in a manner which will convince even the doubters that the United States supports its friends. The logic of the situation is too clear and the supporters of the Pakistan program too strong to permit any other development. It may, and probably will, take a good while to get the program effectively moving: this has been the history of MDAP everywhere. But don’t let the inevitable slow start or possible confusing statement from Washington disconcert you or discourage the Pakistanis. There is solid basis for believing that we are at the beginning of important developments in connection with this program, and we are convinced that all of us concerned with it should proceed on that assumption.
Sincerely,
- This letter was drafted by Daspit and cleared by SOA.↩
- Document 205.↩
- In despatch 649 from Karachi, Apr. 8, Ambassador Hildreth transmitted the Meyers statement as enclosure 2, not printed; see footnote 3, Document 203.↩
- Document 203.↩