his conservative position in foreign policy, and generate goodwill in the American Jewish community to support his upcoming bid for president. In doing so, he demonstrated that a senator can be just as apt to use the State of Israel to his advantage as the Israel lobby is to use a congressional official, which is a counterpoint to the argument made by Mearsheimer and Walt regarding the Israel lobby.5 Fulbright, on the other hand, advocated for more cooperation with the Soviet Union in the hopes of facilitating a comprehensive peace agreement through the United Nations. He regarded increased military sales as a threat to a potential peace agreement.
Instead of looking at the Arab-Israeli peace process through the executive branch, as other scholars have done, this chapter views the issue of military sales seen primarily through the legislative branch, using the often-overlooked collections of important congressmembers to make its case.6 That does not mean to suggest, however, that military sales and peace discussions existed in separate vacuums. Rather, the two have shared something of a symbiotic relationship, with each impacting discussions about the other. One reason Nixon sought to limit military sales was his fear that if Israel were too strong it would resist peace negotiations. Yet Israel fit perfectly into the Nixon Doctrine, which, in light of Vietnam, prescribed sending arms and providing a nuclear umbrella for regional allies in lieu of sending U.S. combat troops abroad. Therefore, the two discussions speak well to each other.
The debates about military aid for Israel revealed a developing alliance between U.S. conservatives and the State of Israel that would continue to impact U.S. foreign policy for decades to follow, in particular with regard to the peace process.7 As shown in the Johnson years, support for Israel started to come from both liberals and conservatives, and increasingly from the latter. This dynamic accelerated during the Nixon years. Conservatives and Cold War hawks like Jackson advanced the congressional critique of Nixon’s foreign policy, putting both Nixon and some liberals on the defensive. They disagreed with détente and aimed to continue the global war against communism, which included substantial military-aid packages, while liberals became more interested in human rights, nuclear nonproliferation, and reduced defense spending.
The perceived interests of U.S. conservatives and the State of Israel started to align. Both sides argued that a strong Israel was important for reasons of Cold War national security, and to achieve a lasting peace in the Middle East required large-scale military sales to Israel, including more Phantoms. For Israel, the United States could replace France as its primary weapons supplier, and for U.S. conservatives, especially in the context of the Vietnam War, Israel could become the new centerpiece of U.S. Cold War foreign policy. As the Cold War consensus fell apart, and as South Vietnam’s position became increasingly untenable, conservative members of Congress shifted more of their focus from East Asia to the Middle East, where they joined many liberals in a revamped, bipartisan support for Israel that resulted in a powerful strategic alliance.
More Phantoms?
Unsatisfied with the status quo, Nasser declared a “War of Attrition” against Israel beginning in March 1969. Using Soviet weaponry, Egyptian forces began a heavy bombardment of Israeli forces along the Suez Canal Zone.8 Israel was largely successful in repelling attacks and offered some of its own, conducting deep raids into Egyptian territory during the first few months of 1970, thanks to U.S.-made Phantoms.9 The first delivery of Phantoms, which arrived in September 1969, extended Israel’s strategic reach and abruptly changed the balance of power. Previously, Israel had launched only a few commando raids into Egypt. But by January 1970 the Phantoms allowed Israel to fly deep bombing raids into Egyptian territory, including the Cairo area. Egypt responded by asking Moscow for greater Soviet involvement, which in turn increased U.S. concern.10
Secretary of State William Rogers tried to assist U.N. special envoy Gunnar Jarring and restart the stalled peace process by offering his own plan. The Rogers Plan, which was announced on December 9, 1969, focused on an Israel-Egypt agreement as a first step in the peace process. Israel was to withdraw from Egyptian territory occupied in 1967, in return for a peace agreement with Egypt that included safe passage of Israeli shipping through the Suez Canal.11 However, the Rogers Plan met a strong refusal. National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger opposed the plan, and Nixon demonstrated ambivalence, not support. As William Quandt writes in Peace Process, “The Israeli and Soviet rejections of the Rogers Plan, and Egypt’s nonacceptance, put a sudden end to the first Middle East initiative of the Nixon administration.”12
The War of Attrition entered a new phase in early 1970 when the Soviet Union secretly increased its military involvement in Egypt with Operation Kavkas.13 In response to Israeli air raids, and using the situation to its geopolitical advantage, the Kremlin substantially increased its military presence in Egypt by sending more than ten thousand “instructors” and “advisers,” along with numerous SA-3 surface-to-air missile systems, which were quietly installed along the Suez Canal. The Soviet Navy strengthened its presence in the Mediterranean, and Soviet pilots became actively engaged in Egyptian air defense.14 Soviet involvement reached a new level on April 18, when Soviet pilots chased down two Israeli jets that had been conducting reconnaissance inside Egypt. The Israeli jets were not attacked, but the Soviet willingness to directly challenge Israeli planes—and by extension the United States—brought with it the possibility for superpower confrontation in the Middle East.
Israel sought to advance its strategic alliance with the United States, but President Nixon responded coolly. Israeli officials asked to purchase an additional 125 planes (one hundred Skyhawks and twenty-five Phantoms) in September 1969. But Nixon declined to meet the new request. Nixon declined the same request again in March 1970, even after it became known that Moscow had increased its military involvement in Egypt. Nixon and Rogers believed that the existing order of fifty Phantoms was enough to keep the military balance of power in Israel’s favor; however, the administration reserved the right to sell new aircraft if the situation changed significantly.15 The administration viewed the Soviet weaponry as defensive in nature and wanted to avoid a further escalation unless it appeared that offensive weapons were being employed.16
Nixon declined to sell additional Phantoms to Israel for several reasons. For one, he believed that U.S. foreign policy in the region had been too biased in favor of Israel. He told Rogers, “I believe that an even-handed policy is, on balance, the best one for us to pursue as far as our own interests are concerned.”17 Second, Nixon recognized that Israel had secretly become a nuclear power and did not want to provide a vehicle to deliver such weapons. Third, he resented the influence of pro-Israel forces in Washington and was determined to conduct U.S. foreign policy apart from domestic influences. Fourth, he hoped peace discussions in the Middle East could advance détente with the Soviet Union.18 Finally, Nixon feared that if Israel had a steady supply of Phantom jets, it would be even less inclined to work with Jarring to implement Resolution 242. In short, by denying further Phantom sales to Israel, Nixon hoped to cultivate better relations with the USSR and Arab states while maintaining leverage with Israel. Therefore, Nixon was unreceptive to repeated calls for the sale of additional F-4s to Israel. But as it had for Johnson, the decision to withhold Phantom sales to Israel put Nixon on a collision course with Congress.
Henry “Scoop” Jackson and William Fulbright
The Democratic Party started to fracture on Israel, and an emerging conservative bloc in Congress, which included hawkish Democrats and some Republicans, proved able to redraw the contours of U.S.-Israel relations. That split was best exemplified by the contentious relations between Henry “Scoop” Jackson and James William Fulbright.
Jackson and Fulbright were senatorial colleagues, but the two were not friends. “Indeed,” says Jackson biographer Robert Kaufman, “the two men detested one another.”19 According to Helen Jackson, Henry’s wife, “The only thing that Scoop and Senator Fulbright agreed on was where to buy wing-tip shoes in London.”20 Fulbright referred to Jackson as “the congressional spokesman
