Lion of Jordan (41 page)

President Johnson was persuaded by his advisers of the need to support Jordan. On 23 November he sent a secret private letter to Hussein that opened by saying: ‘Words of sympathy are small comfort when lives have been needlessly destroyed.' Johnson went on to make two points. First, he assured Hussein that his administration maintained its interest in the peace and security of Jordan and in the well-being of its people. Second, having heard from Burns about Hussein's concern, Johnson wanted to assure him that Israel's policies had not changed and that Israel did not intend to occupy the West Bank of the Jordan River. America's opposition to the use of force to alter borders in the Near East had been made unmistakably clear to Israel both in private representations and in public statements, and Johnson was certain that it was fully understood and appreciated by the Israelis.
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Johnson's letter was significant for the promise it provided to oppose any attempt by Israel to change the border at Jordan's expense, but it did not dispel Hussein's fears. Hussein invited Burns and O'Connell to see him on the evening of 10 December at his private residence at Al-Hummar. Burns had never seen the king so grim or so obviously under pressure. It was apparent that he had to use the utmost self-restraint to keep his emotions from erupting openly. At several points in the conversation Hussein had tears in his eyes. He said that although the demonstrations had abated, pressures under the surface were in fact building up. The discontent on the West Bank was deeper than he had imagined. ‘The growing split between the East Bank and the West Bank has ruined my dreams.' The only thing that bound the army to him, Hussein said, was traditional loyalty, but this was daily growing weaker: ‘There is near despair in the army and the army no longer has confidence in me.'

Hussein said that he was beset on all sides by enemies, outside Jordan and within. Syria was openly calling for his overthrow, publicly offering
arms and covertly infiltrating arms and terrorists into Jordan to help achieve this purpose. Hussein concluded by saying that he simply must have Washington's decision on his request for assistance. For a decade he and America had been partners and at that critical hour they were the only friend to whom he could turn. The right answer from the US would enable him to justify his past policy to his army, to his people, to the PLO and to everyone else. If this was not forthcoming, even he would be forced to conclude that his past policy had been a failure. Repeated delays by America left Hussein no choice, he said, but to agree to the decision of the Arab Defence Council in Cairo to station Saudi and Iraqi troops in Jordan.

If the US turned down Hussein's request for assistance, three courses were open to him, he said: to turn East; to batten down the hatches and take on all his enemies together; or to declare the West Bank a ‘military directorate' and call on the Arab states and the PLO to station forces there to protect it. Of these three courses only the third appealed to him because it would enable him to make a redoubt of the East Bank and thus offer him one last chance to serve his cause. There were many indications in the course of the conversation that Hussein had become suspicious of America's intentions with regard to Jordan. America was too closely tied to Israel and this could inhibit its ability to respond to his request for assistance. Hussein also felt that America did not appreciate the seriousness of the situation in Jordan or the depth of the desire of its enemies to liquidate it. Hussein hoped that his views could be brought to the personal attention of the president.
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Having finished the business part of the meeting, Hussein asked Burns and O'Connell to stay on. In the privacy of his home at Al-Hummar, free from the formal constraints of the royal court, the king proceeded to reveal to his astonished American guests that he had been in secret contact with Israeli leaders for the past three years through clandestine meetings. The purpose of these exchanges, Hussein explained, was to reach understandings that would ensure peace between their two countries and eventually, he hoped, achieve a negotiated settlement of the Palestine problem. Hussein said he wondered what more he could have done to avert what happened. He then added quietly that no one in his country, except himself, knew about these discussions with the Israelis. Hussein repeated that he did not believe in war as a solution to the Palestine problem. He had consistently followed a course of moderation
on the whole question of Palestine in the hope that reasonable men would one day negotiate a just settlement. He had done his utmost to eliminate terrorism against Israel from across Jordan's border. The US knew all these things and so did the Israelis. The Israelis knew it, he said, because ‘I told them so personally.'

Hussein had warned the Israeli leaders, among other things, that he could not absorb or tolerate a serious retaliatory raid. They accepted the logic of this and promised there would never be one. In addition to these secret meetings, Hussein had maintained a personal and confidential correspondence with the Israeli leaders. These messages served to ‘underscore and reinforce our understandings'. The last message he received from the Israelis was to reassure him that they had no intention of attacking Jordan. That message arrived on 13 November, the very day the Israeli troops attacked Samu'. Hussein added that the message was unsolicited and that it was presumably dispatched twenty-four to forty-eight hours before he received it. ‘As far as I am concerned,' Hussein told his American guests, ‘this attack was a complete betrayal by them [the Israelis] of everything I had tried to do for the past three years in the interests of peace, stability and moderation at high personal political risk. Strangely, despite our secret discussions and correspondence, despite secret agreements, understandings, and assurances, I never fully trusted their intentions towards me or towards Jordan. In assessing Israeli intentions I ask you to put my experiences with them into your equation.' Hussein ended the soliloquy on a bitter note: ‘This is what one gets for trying to be moderate, or perhaps for being stupid.' He asked that this information be held in strictest confidence by as few people as possible. Burns, when writing later of this conversation, underscored Hussein's request by recalling that King Abdullah had been assassinated by a Palestinian when it became known that he had contact with the Israelis.
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Reports of the semi-official, semi-private conversation in Al-Hummar fed into a reassessment of American policy towards Jordan that was under way in Washington. The CIA's contribution to this process was an eleven-page memorandum, ‘The Jordanian Regime: Its Prospects and the Consequences of its Demise', prepared by the Office of National Estimates and coordinated with the Office of Current Intelligence and the Clandestine Services. The name of the author was omitted but the content reflects the private knowledge and the views of Jack O'Connell.
Whoever the author, the memorandum sheds much light on what was undoubtedly one of the most critical crises of Hussein's reign. It was noted that ‘King Hussain has stayed on his throne in Jordan despite slender domestic political support, military weakness relative to his enemies, and the hostility of radical Arabs who regard him as a Western puppet.' His survival was attributed in part to his own courage and resourcefulness and in part to US support. Another reason was that the Arab radicals generally tolerated Hussein's rule as an alternative to conflict with Israel for which they knew they were unprepared. ‘As a consequence Jordan served as a kind of political buffer between irreconcilable opponents and to an important degree kept the unstable elements in the area in equilibrium.'

Recent events, however, put the future of Jordan in question and threatened the precarious status quo. The PLO had become more violent in its criticism of Hussein for his refusal to admit Arab military forces to Jordan and to station them on the border with Israel. Al-Fatah stepped up its sabotage raids into Israel, mostly from Jordan, which did its best to prevent them. The Israeli raid on Samu' badly shook Hussein and his government and humiliated the army. In the aftermath of the raid Hussein appeared to his subjects, to his neighbours and perhaps even to himself to have been badly let down by the US. The Palestinians agitated and demonstrated against him and his government for over three weeks. They were enthusiastically egged on by the Syrian government and by Egyptian and PLO propaganda campaigns. Disaffection in the Jordanian armed forces – the mainstay of the king's position – had grown greatly. ‘Hussain is aware of his weakened position at home. He probably believes that the threat from Israel is greater than he had calculated, and has probably lost faith in the
modus vivendi
. He is also deeply concerned lest the US fail to give him firm support. Hence, his first priority is to demonstrate to the Jordanian army and citizenry that he continues to enjoy the full backing of the US. He has asked the US for a large additional supply of arms to help him allay dissatisfaction in the armed forces.'

The US response to Hussein's request was said to be an important factor in the situation: ‘A military aid package, if it included prompt delivery of some showy items, would help the king greatly. A US refusal to extend aid, or to give only token amounts of it, would weaken his position and discourage him.' The clinching argument was that
‘Hussain himself already entertains some suspicions that the US and Israel are collaborating against him, and he would feel that these suspicions were confirmed.' While the memorandum conceded that no amount of US aid could guarantee Hussein's tenure, it pointed out that prompt and substantial assistance could help him to maintain political control. ‘In sum, Hussain's chances of surviving this crisis depend on a number of variables, nearly all of them outside his control. It is clear that he is in deep trouble, and that there are significant dangers to him and to the
modus vivendi
which has helped maintain an uneasy peace in the area.'
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The review resulted, towards the end of December, in a decision to supply military hardware to Jordan, though not on the scale that Hussein had requested. It was generally understood that the collapse of his regime could precipitate open warfare between the Arabs and Israel and that this would not be to America's advantage. As tangible evidence of his administration's continuing support, President Johnson agreed to airlift to Amman military equipment worth $4.7 million in order to improve the mobility, firepower and effectiveness of the Jordanian Army. American officials hoped that Hussein would use this hardware ‘to prevent guerrillas from using Jordan as a base for operations against Israel', and not to prepare for war with the Jewish state.
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Thus, from the beginning to the end of the crisis that finished with the modest package of arms for Jordan, the chief preoccupation of the policy-makers in Washington seemed to be the security of Israel.

Hussein sent a gracious letter to Johnson to thank him for his sympathy, concern and prompt action in helping Jordan to overcome the current crisis. He made no mention of the disappointment of the army chiefs with some aspects of the military aid package. In the negotiations with William Macomber, President Johnson's special envoy, Hussein made it clear that he did not agree with their belief that there had been no basic change in Israeli policy towards Jordan. Hussein understood, however, that the American response was primarily meant to be a way of easing the current situation rather than a way of dealing with a longer-term threat. He could not give a guarantee to keep Arab troops out of his country, but he promised to do all he could, not least because they were not in Jordan's interest either. Finally, Hussein informed Macomber that he intended to continue his moderate policies and measures to enhance regional stability. The only specific measure
mentioned in this connection was to persist in the efforts to prevent terrorist infiltration into Israel.
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Inside the Jordanian national security establishment there were two very different responses to the Samu' affair. One group argued that Jordan needed the other Arab states as the only possible defence against future Israeli aggression and that meant drawing closer to Nasser. The other group, led by Wasfi Tall, argued that Samu' showed that the United Arab Command was a broken reed and that Jordan should therefore concentrate on building up its own defences. Tall pursued a confrontational policy towards the PLO, Syria and Nasser. Hussein recognized Tall's ability, dynamism and devotion, but he wanted a less abrasive prime minister in order to improve relations with the Arab world. In April 1967 Hussein appointed Saad Juma'a as prime minister but kept Tall by his side as chief of the royal court. Juma'a had served as ambassador to the United States and was generally regarded as pro-Western and anti-Nasser. But he was a malleable character and, once he reached the top, faithfully carried out his master's policy of patching up the old quarrels with Cairo and Damascus and calling for a new round of Arab summitry.

Within six weeks of Hussein's change of course, Jordan was involved in a full-scale war with Israel that culminated in the loss of the West Bank. The loyalist version maintains that Jordan had no choice but to fight alongside its Arab brethren. But there was nothing inevitable about the chain of events that plunged the region into war. The June War was an unnecessary one with disastrous consequences for all the Arab participants, but especially for Jordan. The notion of ‘no alternative' was invented by the Jordanian policy-makers to cover up their mistakes and their personal responsibility for the catastrophe that they brought upon their country. Hussein was admittedly faced with an extremely difficult situation, but he also had a range of options from which to choose, and he made the wrong choice. Wasfi Tall kept warning him that jumping on the Egyptian bandwagon would lead to war and to the loss of the West Bank and this is precisely what happened: because of his decision, Hussein lost control over the course of events and ended up losing half of his kingdom.