689.90D/12–2854
Memorandum of Conversation, by the Officer in Charge of Pakistan—Afghanistan Affairs (Thacher)
Subject:
- Afghanistan-Pakistan Relations
Participants:
- Mr. S. Amjad Ali, Ambassador of Pakistan
- NEA—Mr. John D. Jernegan
- SOA—Nicholas G. Thacher
Mr. Jernegan said we had been disturbed by the recent increase of Soviet activity in Afghanistan and had given a good deal of thought to what we might do about preventing Afghanistan from coming under Soviet influence. Earlier today we had explained to Ambassador Ludin some of the ideas we had been considering and handed him an Aide-Mémoire.1 The Afghans have talked about the aid which the United States was giving Iran and Pakistan and have indicated that they felt rather left out. We did not believe that military aid to Afghanistan was the answer since this might well lead to a worsening of Afghanistan’s relations with the Soviets with ill effects overbalancing the benefits of any arms assistance we might be able to deliver. Instead, we have suggested that perhaps Afghanistan might be strengthened economically and its ties with the outside world increased by a greater degree of economic cooperation with Pakistan. This approach would seem to provide a basis for cooperation between the two countries which might in time provide an atmosphere favorable for a settlement of the Pushtun problem. In the Saar and Trieste problems general improvement in the atmosphere surrounding the two disputes without actually concentrating on the disputes themselves had made for conditions favorable to solution. One objection seemed to be that the Afghans seemed afraid of taking any steps that would increase Pakistani capabilities to put pressure on Afghanistan through economic means. However, Mr. Jernegan said, it seemed to us that because of Afghanistan’s geographic location Pakistan already had sufficient capacity to put a great deal of pressure on Afghanistan and this did not seem a valid reason for rejecting improvement of Afghanistan’s [Page 1446] trade and communications channels through Pakistan. We believe, however, that such things as provision of additional railroad cars for Afghanistan’s trade, provision of a free port in Karachi or exchange of power facilities in the Warsak–Jalalabad and the Kajkai-Quetta areas would be very beneficial to both countries, and would in fact provide a real step toward cooperation between them. We had done some very tentative thinking on how we might help, though at present we had no money for such a program. Any possible U.S. aid to help in projects of such a nature would be outside the existing economic aid programs.
Ambassador Ali voiced his general approval for the type of approach Mr. Jernegan had suggested. He said that personally he had been giving the problem of Pakistan-Afghanistan relations a great deal of thought. He had been thinking of suggesting the possibility of giving reduced freight rates—perhaps as much as fifty per cent—to Afghan shipments through Pakistan. He thought much could be done to help the Afghans by a real effort to streamline present Pakistan customs procedures and by the other projects of the type Mr. Jernegan had mentioned. He would write a letter to General Mirza2 (the Prime Minister being out of the country) conveying our ideas. He said he did not propose for the moment, however, to report to his government the fact that we had been discussing these possibilities with the Afghans.