By Alan Cunningham
Introduction
The United States of America and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s relationship has been a tumultuous one, full of diplomatic crises and strained relations. The two countries have been allies since King Abdulaziz Ibn Saud, the first king of Saudi Arabia, met with President Franklin Roosevelt in 1945.[1] Since then, and more prominently in contemporary times, the Kingdom has been and continues to be one of the United States’ closest allies.[2] While their relationship was difficult and fraught with differing viewpoints, they were based around a touchy and controversial subject, one that has been made even more contentious in modern times: religion.
The main religion of Saudi Arabia is Islam, which is standard of many countries in the Middle East and North Africa. While the United States has no official religion, their backing and allying of themselves with the Jewish state of Israel made making connections with other Muslim countries difficult. Both Israel and these Muslim countries did not get along with each other for many reasons, primarily because of their respective religions, but also the fact that Israel was given a plot of land that was religiously and culturally important to the Muslim nations as well as to the Jews. This, along with the unavoidable border disputes, set off several wars and battles. These hostilities towards one another made any sort of diplomacy almost impossible, with all of the Muslim countries rarely siding with Israel. However, the United States attempted to form alliances with all countries, doing so in order to stop an encroachment of Communism that began occurring under the nose of the Eisenhower Administration in the 1950s.
The Beginning of Saudi Arabia and U.S. Entry into the Region
The region now known as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia had been controlled by the Ottoman Empire since the 17th century and, for a long time, the domestic population had attempted to revolt against the Ottomans.[3] Led by a man named Abdulaziz Ibn Saud and heavily supported in terms of manpower and arms by the British, the Saudis were able to reclaim their region from the Ottomans in 1918, at the end of the First World War.[4] Despite a few years of political instability and some internal turbulence, Ibn Saud claimed the title of King in 1927, signing a treaty with the British which recognized him as the rightful ruler, before finally unifying his acquired land masses as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in 1932.[5] The relationship between the West and Saudi Arabia became cemented at the very moment the treaty between the British and Ibn Saud was signed.
Since that time, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the West have maintained a very close relationship, one that is unparalleled in the Middle East. Being one of the more moderate regions in the Middle East, and one of the countries that appeared open to Western influences and ideals, the country seemed to be an ideal ally to many Western nations looking for an ally in the region. However, the country was still centered in Muslim rituals and themes and their relationship with Israel was no different from others in the Middle East.
The country of Israel was officially created in 1948 in response to the worldwide Jewish outcry of wanting their own homeland in order to try and prevent a second Jewish Holocaust from occurring.[6] The area that the Jews claimed as theirs was in the British nation of Palestine, a large Muslim nation, and the specific area was one that held both Jewish and Muslim holy locations, including the Dome of the Rock, one of the most sacred places in religious history. Despite the outcry from many Muslims worldwide, the United Nations essentially carved out a piece of Palestine and gave it to the Jews. This was not met without controversy and the Muslim countries immediately began planning a force to take back the area. In what became known as the First Arab-Israeli War in 1948, the Israelis pushed back against the Arabs and, in an unexpected victory, the Israelis repelled the invaders and kept their homeland, becoming a legitimized nation at the end of the war.[7] This would not be the last conflict between the Israelis and the Arab world and the animosity between both groups would grow with time, resulting in very strained relations.
The United States, at this time, became a much larger force on the world stage due to their having been one of the few world powers that had not been completely destroyed in terms of infrastructure after the Second World War. Envisioning a global committee supportive of democracy, they aimed for that and tried to gain many allies to assist them in their ultimate goal of worldwide democracy. This is one of the reasons why the United States became actively engaged in the Middle East, as well as other parts of the globe.
When President Roosevelt met King Abdulaziz Ibn Saud in 1945, the Kingdom had grown to become a prosperous nation, with a boom in oil and a great revamping of the capital of Riyadh, the city transforming itself from a desert city to a modernized, more Western version of a capital. When Roosevelt and Ibn Saud met, Roosevelt gave the King a DC-3 aircraft and also drew up a contract to send pilots, one that lasts into the current era and plays a large role in many conflicts and events. [8]
In 1956, tensions in the Middle East again arose with the so-called Suez Crisis. A joint British-French-Israeli force invaded Egypt, which was under the control of President Gamal Abdel Nasser, a man who was adamantly opposed to British bases in the Suez region and created a cozy relationship with the Soviets. While this was worrisome to the democratic West, Eisenhower, now President, did not lend his support for the operation so as not to distance his alliance with aviation support to the Kingdom.[9] This was the beginning of a prosperous relationship between the two nations. When the crisis began to show signs of more volatile or serious action, Eisenhower then ordered the UN to intervene and they stopped the conflict before it boiled over into a global calamity.[10]
After Britain and France, which was the stronger force for promoting democracy in the region, were removed from their roles in the Middle East by the UN, the United States decided to take up the more active role as the defender of democracy in the region. This is due to the fact that many of the Muslim nations that the West wanted as allies would not ally themselves with the British or French, who openly sided with the Israelis during the conflict. The Eisenhower Doctrine, a doctrine that was followed by both Democratic and Republican presidents in the following decade, became based around the idea that the U.S. military would become involved in protecting countries from Communism.[11]
Following this doctrine, the government supplied many weapons to anti-Communist countries or countries with no political allegiance in the Middle East. Ironically, many of the countries used these weapons against one another in the Six-Day War of 1967.
Saudi Arabia was a country that frequently took advantage of the arms, manpower, economic and infrastructural aid as well as military technology that the U.S. was essentially giving out to any country that claimed it was under attack by Communism. In 1957, the U.S. sent military advisors to train the King’s newly created helicopter units, naval ships and aircraft as well as the necessary pilots and equipment in return for the Americans using military bases as refueling outposts and collecting intelligence picked up by the Kingdom’s intelligence agencies.[12] [13]
This mutually beneficial relationship of military arms and economic aid from the United States to the Saudis continued into the Kennedy Administration. In 1962, the government, in response to Saudi concerns of Egyptian aircraft flying too close to the border during the Yemeni Civil War (in which the Saudis and Egyptians both supported different sides), sent American planes flown by American pilots to patrol the border in order to deter an attack. The U.S. also sent additional aircraft, naval ships, and an automated air defense system to the Saudis in order to preserve the foothold they held in the country.[14] This warm and extremely friendly relationship stretched from the Kennedy Administration into the Johnson Administration, with Johnson continuing the precedent that Kennedy set in this regard.
Johnson, Weapons Deals, and Saudi Arabia
The United States Government’s role in Saudi Arabia under the Johnson Administration was as a supplier of weaponry, training forces, and military members involved in non-combat operations. This type of operation was classified as roles more related to intelligence collection, defensive operations along the Saudi-Yemeni border, or engineers to construct weaponry systems or some other beneficial type of equipment. In 1966, the government sent anti-aircraft defense systems to be built by American contractors and operated by Saudi military men.[15] In addition to this, the military developed a program in which Saudi Arabian officers would visit the United States and take part in leadership courses at military bases or act as attaches at the Pentagon or elsewhere.
In addition to this, the State Department and the Pentagon acted as intermediaries between the Saudi Arabian government and defense contractors such as Raytheon, the Northrop Corporation, and Lockheed. In an April 5th, 1966 letter from Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s Minister of Defense, Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz, McNamara suggests to the Minister that the Northrop F-5 fighter jet is more suitable to the Saudis than the F-104G by Lockheed.[16] While one might assume that the United States would be trying to merely help their own interests and getting rid of (what they considered) obsolete aircraft, this is not the case. As McNamara points out, the F-5 is easier for training purposes, requires little maintenance, and is more suited for ground support operations than the F-104G; facing a potential conflict in the Yemeni Civil War involving combating aerial vehicles and ground troops, the Saudis could be best suited by the F-5 which had both ground-to-air, air-to-air, and a large missile and payload selection.[17]
This signifies that the United States saw this entire operation as a win-win scenario; by offering the Saudis a concise and descriptive accounting of each aircraft’s capabilities, instead of giving the Saudis outdated vehicles, the Saudis were receptive to this and made their decision with the U. S.’s helpful comments in mind and, if the Saudis were forced to use these in combat, then their weapons would prove effective against the Communist threat. This would also further set the perception that the United States were fully putting the Saudi’s needs ahead of their own interests.
The American government also assisted in training the Saudi police forces and took three-fold measures to ensure this occurred: First, the Americans allowed fifty Saudi students to go through specialized police training and criminal justice courses at American universities. Unlike the exchange program with the military, this was a unique international transfer and one not seen done before. Second, the U.S. Government also arranged for an American professor to come and view the Kingdom’s police forces, giving his insight on how to best improve the capabilities and capacity of the police force. Third, the U.S. Government also arranged for a specially selected team of law enforcement officials to come and provide training for the Saudi’s police forces, a very interesting program that was extremely beneficial to the Saudis. While the amount of effort that the United States was taking to make this happen seems, on the surface, to be of no real value to the United States, it is important to note that, in a report penned on March 30th, 1966 by the U.S. Embassy in Jeddah to the State Department in D.C., the “Ministry of the Interior has [with USG encouragement] carried on a program of educating its security forces in techniques for detecting and combatting Communism.”[18] Being that the United States’ main goal of being in the Middle East was to prevent Communist and Soviet expansion and influence, this makes perfect sense that the U.S. Government was encouraging the Saudis to train their officers in anti- Communist methods.
While the U.S. troops were mainly restricted to training operations, they at times became involved in other non-combat operations. On the night of April 4th, 1964, severe rains turned into floods and trapped roughly 1000 Saudi Arabian national guardsmen who were on a training exercise in the Najran region in southern Saudi Arabia. By the time word reached the embassy at 0500 on April 5th, an unknown number of guardsmen perished and “approximately two hundred were in acute danger and in need of immediate evacuation.”[19] In response, the Embassy ordered that a C-54 and a C-130 (both cargo planes) and two HH-43B helicopters carrying medical personnel and aid be sent to assist the Saudi military in recovering the trapped Guardsmen.
American support wasn’t limited to military matters either. The United States frequently sent educational and infrastructural supplies and advisors in those specific fields to assist the Saudis in order to make them as Westernized as possible and to further their support for the Americans. In the same March 30th, 1966, report from the Embassy to the State Department, the Embassy listed their proposals to assist in educational, mineral exploration, and desalination proceedings. Also, in that same document, the Embassy states that King Faisal bin Abdulaziz Al Saud (King of Saudi Arabia from 1964 to 1975) was expanding economic development programs but was poor at political and domestic social reforms. Furthermore, the Embassy states, “we have yet to find the right leverage for encouraging the King to move ahead in implementing his own promised program of reform.”[20] While some may argue that this shows the United States was genuinely concerned with the way in which the Saudi people were living, it would appear that the U.S. Government worried about losing such a stable and definitive anti-Communist, pro-American leader. While the odds of an anti-American, pro-Communist leader being named the King of Saudi Arabia (in a legal sense) was small, that fear was still present in the government and within the State Department. Keeping a leader who was loved by his people and enjoyed by the American policy makers in power became the overall U.S. objective.
This educational and infrastructural support, while it would assist Saudi interests in keeping their man in power, would also allow the United States to be viewed favorably by the Royal Family and the Saudi Arabian people. This strengthened their relations overall and allowed them more area to operate in both military and diplomatic fields. It would also emphasize the benefits of a democracy as opposed to a Communist government or system of rule.
In a February 20th diplomatic cable, sent from Saudi Defense Minister Abdulaziz to the
U.S. embassy in Jeddah, the Minister delivered a cost estimate and summary of a joint United States-Saudi construction project for a desalination plant near Jeddah. The plant’s main goal was to produce five million gallons of fresh water and produce 36,000 kilowatts of electrical power a day. Roughly 3.6 million people benefited from this plant and its abilities. The U.S. and the Saudis signed an agreement in 1965 detailing the U.S. promising their help in the “design, construction, and installation of the plant.”[21] The U.S. allowed for a team from the Office of Saline Waters from the Department of the Interior be sent over to Saudi Arabia to assist in the construction. This endeavor would be of extreme benefit to the people of Saudi Arabia and showed them that the King was fulfilling the promises he listed in his ascension to the throne. By showing the Americans assisting, the Saudis gave a fantastic perception of the pro-Democratic country and further polarized from Communism and the Soviets.
In a June 1st, 1966 memo from a State Department diplomat named Howard Wriggins to National Security Advisor Walter Rostow, Wriggins recommends that, in preparation for King Faisal’s visit to D.C, President Johnson not gift the King the standard wristwatch. Because the King gives wristwatches to every diplomat stationed in the Kingdom, Wriggins felt such a gift would be seen as inappropriate and disrespectful. Instead, Wriggins suggested the President build a collection of books on various items of American history, Saudi Arabian history, politics, agriculture, and many other topics and present this to the King so it could be included in the University of Riyadh library. Like his promise to rebuild the nation’s infrastructure, bettering the nation’s educational system was another self-proclaimed idea of King Faisal’s, therefore sending an entire library to the university would surely assist in helping Faisal fulfill his promises to the Saudi people and also foster far better relations between the Kingdom and the United States.[22]
Despite all the cooperation between these two nations, the Saudi Arabian government still suffered from anxiety attacks based upon the Americans actions in other parts of the Middle East. At this time, having begun operations like these since the Eisenhower Administration, the United States began supplying almost every country in the entire region with arms and supplies as long as they claimed that they were under threat from Communism. Israel (being besieged from basically all Middle Eastern countries, some of which had Communist or left leaning rulers) received a great deal of aid and support, in the form of weapons, training, and other forms of military and economic aid. Being that the Saudis were enemies of the Israelis, along with the rest of the Middle East, they openly disliked the United States assisting the Israelis in virtually any matter.
Detailed in a phone call (later transcribed into a diplomatic file) from Omar Saqqaf, the Saudi Arabian Minister for Foreign Affairs, to the U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Hermann Elits, Saqqaf made the King’s dislike over the U.S. handing aircraft to Israel known. Saqqaf mentions this has distanced the Saudi public from their U.S. supporters and made the Saudis think differently about their allies. Saqqaf also mentioned that the King would report his disagreement over the American arms sales to the other Arab states.[23] This gave Saudi Arabia a better standing with their Muslim allies and put them in a much better position to not be a puppet of the American government.
In response to the news that the U.S. was selling arms and performing activities in Israel similar to those being done in Saudi Arabia, the Kingdom needed to tread carefully. On one hand, responding too venomously against the U.S. could damage their gain of materials, aid, advisors, and money. Whereas on the other hand, responding too lightly could make other Arab nations think differently about the Saudis, potentially lumping the Saudis in with the U.S. and Israel, thereby making them the enemy.
The Central Intelligence Agency’s Analysis on Saudi Arabian Arms Deals
Neither of these options are ideal and both would have extreme effects upon the ways in which the Saudis were viewed. Therefore, a response to this incident needed to be crafted and delivered quite carefully. This response was brought up in a January 23rd, 1963 National Intelligence Estimate written by Director of Central Intelligence John A. McCone of the Central Intelligence Agency. In his report, McCone mentions that, “The antagonism to Israel remains so strong in the Arab world that no one who values his political life can openly suggest that the Arabs ought to come to terms with Israel…Arab leaders continue to belabor each other with the charges of being “soft on Israel”.”[24] This was a real threat to any Arab leader who tried to bring up the idea of making peace with Israel or at least doing something to better the state of existence that was present. If the Saudis did, then they would lose all power they had in the Arab world and within their own country, making them susceptible to an overthrowing or an invasion, which neither the King of Saudi Arabia or the United States wanted.
Things progressively became worse as tensions mounted after the Suez Crisis in 1956. Potential brushes and close-calls for war between Israel and the Arab states became common. In the early 1960’s, the Central Intelligence Agency began writing many reports on the situation in the Middle East, sensing tensions would boil over and a war or conflict would be imminent. In the same report mentioned previously, Director McCone writes, “Israel will probably retain its overall military superiority vis-à-vis the Arab states.” McCone also states that “incidents growing out of such main points of friction as the Israeli-Syrian border…could escalate into serious fighting.” The report also mentions that, while some regard the conflicts along the Egyptian-Israeli or Jordanian-Israeli border as more serious, the conflict along the Syrian-Israeli border is “more immediately critical.”[25]
This assessment of the problem in the Middle East by the Central Intelligence Agency is a very well-informed one, one made through a dissemination of facts on the ground, State Department files, intelligence both from foreign governmental intelligence agencies and ones that were intercepted by the Agency’s own analysts and operatives. Their assessment is also not too far off from reality either. In another National Intelligence Estimate, written by McCone in December of 1963, he writes in the final conclusion, “In response [to Arab military/economic cooperation], they [Israel] are hardening their posture towards the Arabs. In this situation, tension will be higher in the next few years and the danger of armed clashes greater.”[26] While this estimate is not specific on the most likely scenario to play out in the Middle East, I think, based on the reports, it would be inaccurate to say the Americans were fully blindsided by the Six-Day War. Members inside the Central Intelligence Agency (and probably a few in the State Department in the months leading up to June 1967), who were familiar with Middle Eastern policy, had a fairly good idea of what was to come. Why the White House did not listen to the Central Intelligence Agency and try to change the Israeli position or get the Israelis and Arabs to the bargaining table is a curious question and one that seems to have gone unanswered.
However, the White House was following the precedent set by Kennedy (which followed a very similar vein to the Eisenhower Administration). The Eisenhower Doctrine was a key foreign policy document and, being that Kennedy took a hardline against Communism, this worked well with the goals he wanted to achieve around the globe. After Kennedy’s assassination, Johnson and his administration continued on the same goals and outline that Kennedy set out. Perhaps the reason the Johnson Administration did not listen to the Central Intelligence Agency on this matter is because the Agency was still held in the background and not as seriously considered as other advisors or other independent agencies. After all, Kennedy did not trust the Central Intelligence Agency after the Bay of Pigs fiasco, and this surely made Johnson at least skeptical of the information that he was receiving from them as well. It could also be that the White House was further distracted by the events going on in Vietnam, which was considered more urgent, in terms of foreign policy, than the situation in the Middle East. However, Johnson’s distrust of the Central Intelligence Agency is a key aspect here that undoubtedly influenced Johnson listening to the Agency.
In another National Intelligence Estimate, written by the Director of Central Intelligence Richard M. Helms in April of 1967, two months before the Six-Day War began, the Estimate provides a very in-depth and detailed description of the situation in the Middle East. The estimate also states that the Israelis and Arabs are nowhere closer to creating a peace than they were four years ago and both sides do not want to come to a peace because they held on too closely to their animosities.
While the Estimate primarily mentioned the Arab-Israeli situation and the broader Middle Eastern problems, there was one Estimate written by Helms six months into his tenure in December of 1966, that focused purely on Saudi Arabia. The report mentions King Faisal’s problems with the United Arab Republic and how these problems govern his foreign policy, forcing him to focus much of his time on the United Arab Republic. Despite this, the report shows how the Central Intelligence Agency and members of the intelligence community view the King as “giving the country more effective political leadership and has attempted with some success to use the country’s wealth to promote economic advance.”[27] While this only accounts for how the Central Intelligence Agency views the King, this cannot be a singular view and must be a viewpoint shared by other governmental members inside the White House. In fact, this view was shared by others in the government, based upon State Department and Embassy documents that were discussed earlier.
The document also mentions that a peace between Faisal and Nasser does not appear to be probable in any form due to their blatant differences in government, society, and politics, as well as religion and this stark differentiation will force the other to aid their adversaries. The report additionally states both will continually seek help from their beneficiaries (in this case, the United States aiding the Saudis and the Soviets aiding the Egyptians). The report also makes note of the fact the Saudis do not have any beneficial relations with the Communist party or any country that has Communism as their primary source of political power. Immediately after this statement, the report remarks that the Saudis have a more than excellent relationship with the United States.
The most striking item in these reports from McCone and Helms, however, is when the Central Intelligence Agency postulates about the future of American involvement and foreign policy in the Middle East. In an Estimate written in April of 1964 by McCone, he states, “a serious rise in tensions could probably be contained by great power pressures.”[28] It would also appear that Helms agreed with his predecessor’s assumption as he mentions a similar theme in the conclusion section at the end of a separate 1967 report. In it, Helms states, “In any event, the chances are good that the threat of great power intervention will prevent an attempt by either side to resolve the problem by military force.”[29] Both Helms and McCone, in their numerous National Intelligence Estimates, which were sent to important members in the White House, National Security Council, State Department, Department of Defense, and the FBI on the Arab-Israeli situation, express this idea that the problem could be resolved through the intervention of a greater power, meaning the United States. It would genuinely appear as though those high officials either did not heed these warnings or disregarded them. However, the Central Intelligence Agency gets a large percentage of their estimates in the Middle East correct and this would be proven to the United States government from June 5th to 10th in 1967.
The Six-Day War
The Six-Day War began, as the Central Intelligence Agency predicted, along the Syrian-Israeli border. Being a focal point in many Arab-Israeli arguments, the border was a very contested one, given to the Israelis at first and later demilitarized after the Suez Crisis, with the latter “fix” by the UN not helping the issue whatsoever. Tensions frequently flared up in this area, mainly in the form of small, platoon-size engagements at the most. In the months prior to the all-out conflict, these engagements rose dramatically in their size and content. On April 7th, almost two months before the war, a Syrian fighter, a MiG supplied by the Soviet Union, fired upon farming equipment on the Israeli side and resulted in a battle involving aircraft, tanks, and artillery with six Syrian fighter planes destroyed. After this larger than normal battle, the Israelis and the Syrians sent messages to the United Nations and the United States requesting that this matter be examined. The UN Security Council never considered discussing the case and the United States disregarded the request sent from Israel.[30] This was a warning call to these groups: unless immediate, direct intervention ensued, terrible ramifications would occur.
The conflict began when Syrian fighter jets came closer to Israeli borders. Coupling this with the fact that Arab countries made pacts in recent months and years against Israel and were strengthening their forces along the demilitarized areas toward Israel, Israel declared war and followed this with a surprise attack upon Egyptian airfields. Due to Israeli air superiority, the Israelis covered amazing ground and wiped out their enemies quickly. In fact, when Israel struck against Egypt, they wiped out the entire Egyptian Air Force - over two hundred planes - in under three hours. This action essentially decided the outcome of the war on the first day. Though the Egyptian ground forces still posed a problem and without the ability of the Egyptians to engage in aerial combat, the Israelis demolished their enemies with tenacity and ferocity. Ezer Weizman, the Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Israeli Defense Forces at the time, said later, “The whole plan rested on total surprise. If the scales should tip against us…only four planes were held in defense of Israel’s skies.”[31] Because of Egypt’s pacts with other Arab countries, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq all joined in the fray against Israel, as well as other, smaller countries and factions.
Facing an enemy at roughly 2:1 odds, the outcome did not look good for Israel, a country slightly over 8,000 miles in area with only 264,000 troops that went up against an enemy of almost 550,000 troops and nearly 670,000 miles in area.[32] By looking at the numbers, it appeared the larger, Arab contingent would prevail and crush the smaller, more clustered Israeli force. However, Israel was far better trained and practiced more often than Arab, and in many cases Western nations did, in terms of military matters. In fact, when the other nations declared war on Israel in a show of Arab solidarity, the Israelis launched aerial campaigns against their air forces, either destroying them entirely or severely damaging their capability.[33] By the short war’s end, Israel claimed the West Bank, Golan Heights, Jerusalem, Gaza Strip, and the Sinai, tripling their area to 26,000 miles and successfully pulling off a military, political, religious, and national victory.[34]
What is most interesting about this development is, in the course of the war, a large amount of American made weaponry was used by all sides, not just Israel. While Israel did use a large amount of American made weaponry and vehicles in terms of aircraft, tanks, air defense systems, the Arab world used these as well. In 1966, the State Department assisted in sending tanks to Jordan and Hawk missiles to Saudi Arabia. In addition to sending Hawk missiles to the Saudis, the Hawks were sold to Israel and the Iranians.[35] These missiles were cheap to produce, in terms of regular government expenditures, around $250,000 per missile, and were compact, mobile, and extremely accurate. These defense articles made them a prime candidate for use in countries that requested security assistance and these weapons were used in many conflicts, some lasting into the present day.
It is also quite ironic that the United States armed a great deal of the countries in the Middle east. By sending arms such as the Hawk missiles, tanks, and aircraft to various nations in the area for years prior to the conflict, the United States essentially armed their own ally’s enemies and, in effect, their enemies too. By arming every side, the Six-Day War featured a large amount of American made weaponry in addition to French and British weaponry and aid materials by either side and each side was effectively angry at the Americans due to their effect on the outcome of the war.
In addition to supplying arms to all of the Arab countries in the region, betting on all the horses in the race, so to speak, the Americans did little to intervene in the weeks and months prior to the crisis erupting. Despite a great deal of evidence of tensions approaching a boiling point, the United States and the United Nations did very little in the way of attempting to stall the conflict from occurring. Even when the hostilities began, the United States did nothing to attempt to mediate the crisis, allowing the activities to continue. The first time the United States and the United Nations intervened was in the final days, when Israel regained a significant amount of their territory and considered moving further into enemy territory. At the United States and United Nations’ request, Israel agreed to a cease-fire with the Arab nations.[36] [37]
Saudi Arabia During the Six-Day War
Saudi Arabia’s actions during the Six-Day War accurately reflected their stance in the region. King Faisal, like many of the other nations, was a proponent of Arab solidarity. However, Faisal not only had to walk a very thin line of appeasing his own Arab neighbors and his own people, but also had to keep relations with the United States and the West profitable. This was a very fragile situation where, if there was a misstep anywhere, it would mean disaster. If Faisal neglected to stand with the Arab world, this would be interpreted as siding with the Israelis and Americans and would leave him open to potential sanctions by the Arab world and, possibly, an overthrowing of his regime by his own people. If Faisal gave his support for the Arabs openly, then Saudi Arabia became an open target if Israel decided to advance further into the Arab world. Not to mention that the Americans may revoke or severely limit their military or economic aid and that aid was extremely vital and necessary. The Saudi response, though, was a very delicate and appropriate response to the Six Day War.
When the Jordanians, Egyptians, and various other nations began committing troops to the engagement, the Saudis stayed behind and did not commit any combat troops. However, King Faisal ordered a brigade (consisting of 3,000 soldiers) sent near Amman, the capitol of Jordan.[38] Jordan rests in between Saudi Arabia and Israel. It is entirely possible Faisal did this to both show his solidarity with the Arab world against the Israelis and, in a more selfish way, to protect himself from the Israelis if they decided to advance further into Arab territory. Additionally, this action of placing support troops was seen as being in line with the rest of the Arab world and appeased his own Saudi people while also seen as a non- threatening action against the Israelis to the United States.
Aftermath and Consequences
The aftermath and consequences of the Six-Day War became felt across the entire globe. The Arab world’s resilience and pride was shaken to its very core, and they felt humiliated. The outrage against Israel intensified heavily and the Arab world’s anger against the nation only increased by the turn of events. The decade-plus long policy of providing weapons to nations against Communism also backfired against the Western nations, the United States, Britain, and France in particular. The revelation that the United States was supplying weapons to both the Israelis and the Arabs was not a new one, but, during the events of the war, an accusation made by Nasser extremely damaged relations.
During the war, but only made available in recent years due to declassified military documents, Israeli intelligence caught communications between Nasser and King Hussein of Jordan. They were disseminating false intelligence to other Arab nations indicating American paratroopers were actively assisting the Israelis on the ground. The U.S. military had no paratrooper units of any kind actively fighting alongside the Israelis, but this lie worked itself into becoming a much believed fact by Arab countries after the war.[39] This disinformation, coupled with the actual fact America heavily supplied arms of multiple kinds to the Israelis, turned many Arab countries against the West in general and the United States in particular.
The Arabs were not the only party angry at the Americans for their actions. Israel, despite having won the war, was equally distressed at the United States due to their inability to support them on the ground and for sending arms which would be used by their enemies. Much like how the Arab countries viewed the United States as being a backer of the Israelis, the Israelis viewed the United States as backing the Arabs and not being fully supportive of the Israeli mission.
In fact, this war had disastrous effects for both the West and the Soviets. The Soviets, who only intervened when the United States and the UN did near the end, were at first rejoicing at the anti-American sentiment that many Arab nations harbored, but this later turned out to be equally terrible for the Soviets. The Arab nations saw the Soviets did little to assist in their problems besides equip the Arab forces and, while this was good, it was far more beneficial to supply the countries with something more than mere equipment and training missions. The Arabs began to move away from the Soviets and the United States equally, starting to turn more inward and look to their Arab neighbors for solace and support. In effect, the United States and the Soviets both lost more territory than they gained. They lost a great deal of groundwork made in almost fifteen years of aid, time, and money.
The United States, similar to the Soviets, had the goal of building up pro-Democratic nations in the Middle East which were pro-U.S and anti-Communist. This action worked for a time, but the administrations in power seemed to forget the possibility that countries may be playing the U.S. just to receive military, economic, social, and political aid. The U.S. either never considered this as an option or ignored it completely. It would heavily appear the Six-Day War was, in terms of foreign policy, a pyrrhic victory; the United States won in terms of stopping Communism and the encroaching Soviet mindset in the region, but they lost their own support in the region due to their support of Israel (because of the real and false intelligence broadcasted between the Arab nations).
The United States, however, somewhat brought this end-state upon themselves. Following the Eisenhower doctrine and the agenda set up by Kennedy in the region, the Johnson Administration began sending arms and supplies to almost every country that requested aid, neglecting to consider the very detailed and accurate reports made by the Central Intelligence Agency leading up to the war. While the reports did not suggest the wanton sending of arms to Arab countries was the source of the problems in the Middle East, these multiple reports should have planted in the minds of the White House staff the need to start reading the signs of distress in the area more thoroughly and prepare to intervene and stop a conflict should one arise. This, however, never happened and the region became far more unstable due to this event.
Conclusion
The Six-Day War is an important one, certainly in Middle Eastern history, but also global history. While one may say such a small conflict involving so few countries cannot be important to global affairs, these six days of air-land combat would define an entire region and cause many more region-shaking events. The war resulted in a worsening of Arab-Israeli relations. This deepening of the hatred between the Jewish and Muslim religions sparked Islamic and Jewish fundamentalism, which caused many problems in the late 20th century and 21st century in terms of terrorism.
Additionally, the relationship between the United States and the Arab countries was severely affected. Many Arab countries cut off their lines of communication with the U.S. government upon the false revelation that the Americans were assisting in ground operations on the Israeli side. In fact, the Arab world, at a conference in Khartoum to discuss which direction to take after the war, came very close to creating an oil embargo towards the United States, but the moderate states were able to overcome the more far-left anti-Israel and Western states and stopped the embargo.[40] Despite this, many Arab states still harbored an animosity against the Americans and this would not subside over time.
The relationship between the U.S. and the Saudis did not seem to change much. The Saudis realized that American support for their regime and military was necessary and, in order to fight off the radicalized elements of the Arab world, support would be necessary. However, this does not mean that unrest and anger at the United States was absent. After the Six-Day War, in Jeddah and Riyadh, two of the largest cities, the latter being the capitol in Saudi Arabia, Saudis protested in various areas. In some cases, these protests turned violent, with the U.S. Embassy and an airbase being attacked by students from what was then known as the ARAMCO College of Petroleum and Minerals.[41] However, these protests were slight compared to others in the Middle East.
Regardless of this, the Saudis still showed they were standing beside the Americans by protesting against the oil embargo in the Khartoum conference. This demonstrated to the United States that the Saudis were willing to be allies and would support their own allies in the best way they could without endangering their own position. This remained precarious as time went on, however, as through all of the tumultuous times that the Kingdom and the United States endured, matters like global terrorism, deteriorating Arab-Israeli relations, and controversial military engagements in the Middle East, the two countries stood together as a united force and remain an example of a great American partnership in this region.
About the Author: Alan Cunningham is a graduate of Norwich University, where he pursued an MA in International Relations in 2021. He previously attended the University of Texas at Austin, gaining a B.A. in History and a B.S. in Radio-Television-Film, and aims to attain a PhD in History from the University of Birmingham. He has been published on multiple other sites including the U.S. Army War College’s War Room, the John Jay College of Criminal Justice’s The Crime Report, the University of Pittsburgh School of Law’s Jurist, Eunomia Journal, Security Magazine, and Modern Diplomacy. He is working on joining the U.S. Navy in 2022 and hopes to serve as an Intelligence Officer.
[1] Bruce Riedel, “75 years after a historic meeting on the USS Quincy, US-Saudi relations are in need of a true re-think,” Brookings Institution, Brookings Institution, published 10 February 2020, https://www.brookings.edu/blog/order-from-chaos/2020/02/10/75-years-after-a-historic-meeting-on-the-uss-quincy-us-saudi-relations-are-in-need-of-a-true-re-think/. [2] Madawi Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 100. [3] William L. Oschenwald, Harry St. John Bridger Philby, & Joshua Teitelbaum, “Saudi Arabia: History: Struggle with the Ottomans,” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., published 26 July 1998, updated 14 November 2020, https://www.britannica.com/place/Saudi-Arabia/The-Wahhabi-movement#ref45225. [4] Scott Anderson, Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East (New York, NY: Anchor Books, 2013), 491. [5] Oschenwald, Philby, & Teitelbaum, “Saudi Arabia: History: Ibn Saud and the third Sa’ūdī state,” Encyclopædia Britannica. [6] “Creation of Israel, 1948,” Office of the Historian, United States Department of State, updated 01 June 2017, https://history.state.gov/milestones/1945-1952/creation-israel. [7] Michael B. Oren, Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East (New York, NY: Presidio Press, 2003), 05. [8] G. Jefferson Price III, “The U.S. romance with Saudi Arabia is 70 years old this Valentine’s Day,” The Baltimore Sun, Tribune Publishing, published 12 February 2015, https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion/op-ed/bs-ed-saudi-arabia-20150212-story.html. [9] Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, 91. [10] Alan Axelrod, The Real History of the Cold War (New York, NY: Sterling Publishing Co., 2009), 308-310. [11] Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, 114. [12] Lawrence Wright, The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (New York, NY: Random House, Inc., 2006), 68. [13] Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, 114. [14] Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, 115. [15] Memo, U.S. Embassy in Jeddah to State Department, 3/30/66, “Annual U.S. Policy Assessment – Saudi Arabia,” Country File, NSF, Box 155, LBJ Library. [16] Letter, Robert McNamara to Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, 4/05/66, Country File, NSF, Box 155, LBJ Library. [17] Ibid. [18] Memo, U.S. Embassy in Jeddah to State Department, 3/30/66, “Annual U.S. Policy Assessment – Saudi Arabia,” Country File, NSF, Box 155, LBJ Library. [19] Cable, State 003928 to Riyadh, 4/05/64, #83, “Papers of Lyndon Baines Johnson President 1963-1969,” Country File, NSF, Box 155, LBJ Library. [20] Memo, U.S. Embassy in Jeddah to State Department, 3/30/66, “Annual U.S. Policy Assessment – Saudi Arabia,” Country File, NSF, Box 155, LBJ Library. [21] Memo, 2/20/66, “U.S. Assistance for Jeddah Desalting Plant,” Country File, NSF, Box 155, LBJ Library. [22] Memo, Harold Wriggins to Walter Rostow, 6/01/66, “Gift for Faisal, a Second Look,” Box 156, LBJ Library. [23] Memo, Ambassador Elits to Secretary of State’s Office, 5/05/66, “US Arms Sale to Israel,” Box 156, LBJ Library. [24] Memo, Director John McCone to D.C., 1/23/63, “The Arab-Israeli Problem,” NSF, National Intelligence Estimates File, Box 6, LBJ Library. [25] Ibid. [26] Memo, Director McCone to D.C., 12/04/63, “The UAR Missile Program and its Implications for Israel,” NSF, National Intelligence Estimates File, Box 6, LBJ Library. [27] Memo, Director Helms to D.C., 12/08/66, “The Role of Saudi Arabia,” NSF, National Intelligence Estimates File, Box 6, LBJ Library. [28] Memo, Director McCone to D.C., 4/08/64, “Main Trends in the Arab World”, NSF, National Intelligence Estimates File, Box 6, LBJ Library. [29] Memo, Director McCone to D.C., 4/13/67, “The Arab-Israeli Dispute: Current Phase”, NSF, National Intelligence Estimates File, Box 6, LBJ Library. [30] Robert W. Stookey, America and the Arab States: An Uneasy Encounter (New York City, NY: John Wiley & Sons Inc., 1975), 203. [31] Lawrence Wright, Thirteen Days in September: The Dramatic Story of the Struggle for Peace (New York City, NY: Vintage Books, 2015), 191. [32] “The Six-Day War: Background & Overview,” Jewish Virtual Library, 2017, accessed 19 Nov 2017, https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/background-and-overview-six-day-war. [33] Oren, Six Days of War, 171-172. [34] Ibid. [35] Stookey, America and the Arab States: An Uneasy Encounter, 197. [36] “The Six-Day War: Background & Overview,” Jewish Virtual Library. [37] Stookey, America and the Arab States: An Uneasy Encounter, 207. [38] Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, 124. [39] Wright, Thirteen Days in September, 192. [40] Memo, Roger Morris to Harold H. Saunders, 9/07/67, “The US and Communist Powers in the Middle East 1964- 1967,” NSF, National Intelligence Estimates File, Box 6, LBJ Library. [41] Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, 124-125.