123. Minutes of the Secretary of State’s Staff Meeting1 2
In Attendance (Fri., 12/20/74)
- Secretary of State Kissinger (presiding as Chairman)
- D Mr. Ingersoll
- P Mr. Sisco
- E Mr. Robinson
- T Mr. Maw
- C Mr. Sonnenfeldt
- AF Mr. Easum
- ARA Mr. Rogers
- EA Mr. Habib
- EUR Mr. Hartman
- NEA Mr. Atherton
- INR Mr. Hyland
- S/P Mr. Lord
- EB Mr. Katz (Acting)
- S/PRS Mr. Anderson
- S/AM Mr. McCloskey
- PM Mr. Vest
- IO Mr. Buffum
- H Mr. Holton
- L Mr. Aldrich (Acting)
- S/S Mr. Springsteen
- S Mr. Borg
- M Mr. Brown
[Omitted here are portions of the discussion unrelated to the Horn of Africa.]
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Don?
MR. EASUM: 15 seconds on Ethiopia. We’re proceeding with our pipeline deliveries—Ethiopians know this—on our Military Assistance Program.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Do we know anything about that government?
MR. EASUM: We know that there’s a hundred and twenty-man executive council, whose profile is not very clear to anybody. We talked just last night with some high Somalis who have just come from Somalia. They share our ignorance of the organization. The organization is in doubt concerning some of the basic decisions it said it was going to make, but it now appears [Page 3] to be in doubt about the basic form.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: But how can a hundred and twenty men make decisions?
MR. EASUM: Exactly. It’s difficult. They’ve gone back on their decision to send the hundred and sixty university students out in the bush to teach them Amharic, and it’s not clear where they’re going. However, it’s clear they are interested in our relations with them and we are with them. We think it’s important to continue the implementation of this.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: What does that mean—they’re interested in good relations with us? Do they have a Foreign Minister?
MR. EASUM: Kifle has just been appointed their Ambassador.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Bill, do you have a different view?
MR. HYLAND: Well, I’d say the people we talked to are just the front men and they’re saying things behind the scenes and the military people are much more radical than the group they execute. And they’re starting to play around with the Chinese. The drift is to the left—clearly.
[Page 4]SECRETARY KISSINGER: That’s what I would have expected.
MR. EASUM: We think, for this reason, we should keep the Military Assistance Program moving, but keep the strings on the F–5s which have been allocated—the TOW missiles and 11 more M–60 tanks.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Maybe we can get these TOW missiles in Chile. (Laughter.) We won’t rest until we get Chile in that shape too.
MR. HYLAND: Would you agree, Don, that the one thing they are obsessed with is the war in Eritrea; and if we start cutting off military supplies—
SECRETARY KISSINGER: No, but we’re not cutting off military supplies.
MR. HYLAND: No. But he said we ought to be able to pull off military items.
MR. EASUM: But if they start a war in Eritrea, we don’t want them to be so committed. There is no war in Eritrea.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: No, but when you say “pull the string,” are you doing it already?
MR. EASUM: No.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: That wouldn’t be done without [Page 5] my knowledge, would it?
MR. SISCO: In fact, we’ve got a paper to you saying we ought to go ahead when they get to that particular point.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: Have they been told they’ve got to pull the string?
MR. VEST: No. It’s a matter of review.
SECRETARY KISSINGER: O.K., fine.
[Omitted here are portions of the discussion unrelated to the Horn of Africa.]
- Source: National Archives, RG 59, Transcripts of Secretary of State Henry Kissinger’s Staff Meetings, 1973–1977, Entry 5177, Box 5, Secretary’s Staff Meetings. Secret.↩
- Secretary of State Kissinger, Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Easum, and Director of the Bureau of Intelligence and Research Hyland briefly reviewed the current situation in Ethiopia and the implications of military assistance.↩