Office of the Historian

150. Memorandum From the President’s Special Assistant for National Security Affairs (Bundy) to President Johnson1

Washington, April 29, 1965.

Habib Bourguiba, Jr., now Tunisia’s foreign minister, is coming in briefly to deliver a letter from his father.

Simply knowing that you appreciate Tunisia’s stance will give Bourguiba, Sr. a big boost. He has gone way out on a limb in recommending that Arabs and Israelis negotiate a Palestine settlement. Even though this is unworkable now, it took courage to be the only Arab leader to recognize that Israel is here to stay. Other Arabs have criticized him bitterly. Bourguiba has also publicly supported our position on negotiation without preconditions in Vietnam.

To be honest, Tunisia’s forthright stand is partly designed to generate maximum US backing for its next development plan. It wants (1) a pledge of specific support—we’re giving a general assurance but don’t want to make another multi-year commitment; (2) a $30–40 million foreign exchange cushion to start the next plan. We’ll help meet the need but, again, don’t want to talk amounts until we figure out how much is required.

In sum, we want to be as re-assuring as possible, both to show it pays to be friendly and because Tunisia is using our aid well (Tunisia is one of the seven countries AID is concentrating on). Possible Talking Points are: (1) You hope his father’s courageous stand on the Palestine issue will win followers among the sensible Arab leaders when the initial shock wears off; (2) you’re aware of Tunisia’s effective development effort and can assure him that, even though we don’t want to commit ourselves to a specific amount of aid now, we will support Tunisia’s development during its next 4-year plan; (3) it’s important to get the Western Europeans more heavily involved in Tunisian development, not to get ourselves off the hook but because Tunisia’s most profitable natural economic relationship is with Europe; (4) your best wishes to his father.2

McG. B.
  1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, Tunisia, Vol. I, Memos & Miscellaneous, December 1963–September 1968. Confidential.↩
  2. Attached to the source text is a typed note that reads: “Mr. Bundy: I saw him and it went fine. LBJ/mf, 4–29–65, 2:45p”; see Document 151.↩