147. Memorandum From the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Brzezinski) to President Carter1

SUBJECT

  • Initial Reaction to the Latest Middle East Difficulty

Here are some personal and initial thoughts, stated in a telegraphic style and therefore overly simplistic:

1) You succeeded at Camp David because:

a) You kept both parties under your control;

b) Neither dared to assume responsibility for failure;

c) The Agreements offered something beneficial to both;

2) The Agreements are coming apart because:

a) The negotiations are no longer under your control;

b) The Camp David Accords created the impression that in fact a separate peace between Egypt and Israel was acceptable to both the US and to Egypt—and for a while I even thought that perhaps you and Sadat had secretly agreed on this;

c) Begin probably does not want to move on the West Bank part of the Accords, and he might be genuinely intimated by his domestic opposition (though he is also doubtlessly exploiting it);

d) Sadat became frightened by the Baghdad Conference2 reaction, and notably by the more critical Saudi attitudes;

e) Sadat and the Saudis may be concluding that the US is too irresolute either to protect the region from the Soviets or to obtain from the Israelis genuine progress toward a wider peace.

3) What is to be done? Not knowing what Khalil is bringing,3 I can only tentatively recommend:

a) A strong U.S. public posture on behalf of broad implementation of the Camp David Accords. If we can set a deadline for the Israeli/Egyptian Peace Treaty, we can surely have a target date for the West Bank/Gaza elections;

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b) A full-press effort to get Sadat to accept the treaty; perhaps with a public interpretation by him of Article VI to the effect that it does not negate his defense commitments and a Saudi blessing for this position;

c) Followed by a similarly energetic effort to get Israel to accept the target date and to initiate a substantive dialogue with the Palestinians and a negotiation with Egypt on the scope of authority for the autonomous regime.

4) How is it to be done?

a) Have the Vice President go back with Khalil to tell Sadat that U.S.-Egyptian cooperation will in effect come to an end unless Egypt accedes to the treaty, but if Sadat does agree, then the US would engage in long-term military and economic cooperation with Egypt and with the Saudis on behalf of regional security and specifically to contain Soviet influence. We would need to tell Sadat specifically what we are prepared to do in the military assistance field for this approach to have credibility; and we would have to tell him that if he accedes to our request that we will proceed as in c) below.

b) Have him repeat essentially the same message to the Saudis;

c) Then—if he is successful—proceed to Israel and tell Begin that Israeli failure to accept the timetable and to begin positive movement on the West Bank/Gaza will mean that the US will take the entire matter to the UN Security Council, and consequently that the U.S.-Israeli economic-military relationship will not be allowed to perpetuate a stalemate which will inevitably radicalize the Middle East and reintroduce the Soviets into the region;

d) For the above to work, we must be genuinely prepared to be as direct and blunt as is stated above; so far, we have never managed to be and we have always backed off at the last minute. In fact, I am not sure that anyone on your team could carry this out in the proper manner, and perhaps, in the final analysis, the only way would be for you to do it by letter, maybe reinforced by an additional verbal message delivered personally by the Vice President.

  1. Source: Carter Library, Brzezinski Donated Material, Geographic File, Box 14, Middle East—Negotiations: (9/77–12/78). Top Secret. Carter initialed “C” at the top of the memorandum, indicating that he saw the document.
  2. See footnote 7, Document 91.
  3. See Document 148.