Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969–1976, Volume XXV, Arab-Israeli Crisis and War, 1973

154. Transcript of Telephone Conversation Between Secretary of State Kissinger and the Minister of the Israeli Embassy (Shalev)¹

Washington, October 11, 1973, 11:10 a.m.

K: What is the Ambassador doing in a Synagogue on Thursday.

S: It is the first day of [Sukkot] and a bar mitzvah and for morale he went for a few minutes.

K: For my morale, it is not very good for you on the one hand to ask me to slow down the UN and you get Dayan to say on radio and TV that you are heading for Damascus.² How can we get the UN to slow down when you make this kind of announcement by your Defense Minister.

S: You have a point.

K: With the greatest difficulty I got the President to slow things down and now I am confronted with that news item. What will I tell the Soviets now?

S: I will get on to Israel.

K: Point two. The President is beside himself with what he considers inspired newspaper articles and I urge you to keep your people under control in what they say to the press. If it gets back to the White House that someone has talked to Israeli personnel there will be hell to pay.

S: Do you have anything specific?

K: I have nothing but he said he has. I was going to wait and call you about this after I had something else to talk to you about. If you want to cooperate with us diplomatically you must cooperate with us on this. We cannot ask the UN to slow down with this announcement that is out. I am sitting here with my associates now working on this 36 hour delay when we get this ticker. Second, what in the hell am I now going to tell the Russians. This looks like the most extreme form of collusion and bad faith. You would have had the 8 hours for the reality of this to become apparent if you had kept quiet. See what you can do to quiet things down in Israel and for God’s sake stay off the radio and TV. Will you let me know?

S: I will.³

1. Source: National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, Kissinger Telephone Conversations, Transcripts (Telcons), Chronological File, Box 22. No classification marking.
2. Dayan made the statement during a visit to the front in the Golan Heights. See The New York Times, October 12, 1973.
3. At 3:05 p.m., Dinitz telephoned Kissinger and said that he had just received a cable from Meir, who said she was doing everything in her power to urge restraint. Kissinger told the Ambassador that he had just ordered the military to charter 20 aircraft for the Israelis to transport the military equipment. He noted that he could delay the Security Council meeting through that night, but could not avoid doing something with the Russians, saying he had been avoiding Dobrynin all morning. The Secretary said he thought that by the following night the United States would have to move in the United Nations. Dinitz asked if a standstill resolution was what Kissinger had in mind, and the Secretary replied that it was. (National Archives, Nixon Presidential Materials, Kissinger Telephone Conversations, Transcripts (Telcons), Chronological File, Box 22) Printed in Kissinger, Crisis, pp. 185–186.