Doomed to succeed is a book by Dennis Ross that talks about America’s relationship with Israel. This is explained through a series of America’s different administration from the period of Truman to Obama. How these administrators solved the issue of America’s relationship with Israel and the region. Presidents and their associates led the administrations. The book has so many presidents mention but in this essay, I am going to talk about Eisenhower, Nixon and Ford, Carter, and Reagan’s administration with their associates.
Dwight Eisenhower worked closely with John Foster Dulles to shape the foreign policy in America with the view of countering the Soviet Union. These leaders focused on the Middle East as opposed to Truman, who put his focus on Europe. Dulles actually took and expensive trip to the Middle East in search of Arabs and not Israelis. He told Arabs what they wanted to hear. That is, they had an interest with Arabs and that the Americans would not ignore them anymore. Dulles also talked to Egypt’s Prime Minister, Gamal Abdel Nasser, and told him about the power of Revolutionary Command Council (RCC) that local concerns would not hinder America from coming to their aid. In their administration, they avoided formal membership of the Baghdad pact so that the British could not overpower them and develop allies with Egypt. The strategy was to collaborate easily with Arabs by ending the conflict between them and Israel. These conflicts included incidents like Israel diverting the Jordan River to make hydroelectric power. Other strategies that Eisenhower’s administration used were secretly working with other bodies like the CIA to unite the Arab’s Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, with Nasser, which did not really work out well. They also joined British and French until French began planning action against them, which eventually the British also joined in. Eisenhower realized the plan and felt so betrayed. He thus suspended loans to Israel until they all backed down. The Soviet leadership saw this and planned attacks against London, but Eisenhower suspected that they were working with the Israelis. Eisenhower was brave enough to make plans against them and the Israelis withdrew, but with conditions, which Eisenhower agreed to limitedly. With all these efforts and objectives, Eisenhower did not succeed in overpowering Israel. His administration actually ended up being weakened instead of being strengthened.
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The other administration I am going to talk about is that led by Nixon and Ford. Richard Nixon’s policy was characterized by mixed messages majorly to the Israelis. The messages were about peace, which they resisted. Nixon also accepted to rebuild ties with the Arabs and work with the Soviet with the aim of ending the Soviet domination of the Arabs. Just as the administration discussed above, Eisenhower and Dulles’ administration, Nixon saw the close relationship with Israel, which he was working to make sure there is distance. Nixon’s pursuit of making peace in the Middle East was to mend the relationship with the Arabs, which he felt was broken and was with the fear of risking another war. This was because they felt that the Soviet was still the victor in apolitical war. This administration also launched peace initiatives. Once incident would be trying to praise Israel so that they could agree to their requests like the ‘hardware for software’ request. This request was about America, providing arms for Israel’s flexibility, which was actually a trick since no arms would be provided. The Israelis making Nixon’s administration have a growing problem rejected these plans. Nixon’s administration actually divided in the process. Nixon advocated for renewing of relationships in Egypt while Kissinger, Nixon’s associate, wanted Israelis to have arms. The Israelis kept on involving themselves in wars until Richard asked them to sit down and negotiate through project ‘Stop shooting and start talking’. It took some time before the Israelis agreed to stop wars but were not ready for negotiations. Kissinger ended up shaping Middle East diplomacy during Nixon’s second term. More attention was now paid to Israelis as compared to during Eisenhower’s time, the Arabs felt that their loyalty was to the United States, and kept on blaming Israel for the creations of problems.
The third administration is Carter’s presidency. ‘Irony’ was the word used to describe this administration. Carter was so committed to bringing Arab-Israel peace. His administration saw Israel as an irritant, which always frustrated any plans for making peace in the Middle East. In most of Carter’s presidency, Arab-Israel peace was the issue he mostly tried to solve. He would write, “Looking back, it is remarkable to see how constantly the work for peace in the Middle East was on my agenda, and my mind” (Ross, 2015) . It is clear that Israel really occupied Carter’s occupations since his aim was peace, which Israel acted as a block towards achieving it. This however made Carter not see other issues that cropped up like the Iran issue. Carter and Nixon’s administrations are alike in that they both advocated for Arab-Israel peace. However, they had a difference in that Carter’s administration had no division, as was the case with Nixon’s administration. All of Carter’s associates were on the same page in the strategy of making Arab-Israel peace. If there were security between Israel and its neighbors, there would be peace so Carter went to an extent of providing security to Israel and Egypt. He also arranged to have meetings with Arab and Israel leaders. The Arab leaders were in agreement with him and promised to be ready to make peace and end the disputes, but Israel leaders did not believe in territorial compromising. In general, we can say that Carter’s administration paid much attention to the Middle East, through so many peace negotiations, hence ended up missing emerging issues or rather threats like the anti-American Islamic fundamentalism that was in Iran.
The last administration that I am going to talk about is Ronald Reagan’s administration. This administration was not so different from Jimmy Carter’s administration. He was interested in the Soviet Union, which he referred to as the ‘evil empire’ since he felt that it acted as a block to America’s interests around the world. Reagan actually wanted to force the Soviet Union to come down and his strategy was to work on the military capability. It was all about competing with the USSR by playing with its vulnerability and the vulnerabilities of its associates. He saw Israel as a natural partner whereby he said, “The fall of Iran has increased Israel’s value as perhaps the only remaining strategic asset in the region on which the United States can truly rely…” (Ross, 2015) . Reagan had an emotional attachment to Israel due to his past activities of making films during World War 2; he believed in providing security for them. As ‘irony’ describes Carter’s administration, ‘duality’ describes Reagan’s administration. Reason being, he is the first to suspend aircraft deliveries as a form of punishment to Israelis, but still the first to advocate for the establishment of a strategic cooperation with Israel. However, his associates saw Israel, as a problem, hence had no commitment towards them. In Reagan’s presidency, he expected to have a close relationship with Israel but was shocked and disappointed by them through their government. There was actually a Memorandum of Understanding, which there was fear that it would not last long since Israel did not care because whether they followed it or not, they had nothing to lose. Israel still had wars with other countries until Iran Critia, which ended the divisions. Generally, we can say that Reagan wanted peace with both the Arabs and the Israelis since he believed that this would bring peace in the region. This was logical, but seemed a little difficult to achieve.
The incidents above all talk about leaders in America and their struggle to create a relationship between them and the Israelis. Actually with regions around them. Peace is an important element in the society. Without peace, governance does not become effective. All leaders should work on ensuring that their territories have peaceful relations with their neighbors.
