In observance of Rosh Hashanah, President Ronald Reagan recalled the Jewish New Year’s Day legend of sorting the righteous from the wicked. “The wholly righteous are at once inscribed and sealed in the Book of Life,” Reagan said. “The wholly wicked are at once inscribed and sealed in the Book of Death.” His previously prepared statement was issued September 18 as newspaper dispatches and network film unveiled the horrors of Sabra and Shatila. The massacre jolted Reagan. And the shock disabled his top advisers. William Clark, his adviser on national security affairs, and Secretary of State George Shultz filled the aging actor with misinformation. They could not sort the righteous from the wicked.
At a September 17 political fund-raiser in New Jersey, Reagan seemed to justify Israel’s invasion of West Beirut. “It is true that what led them to move back in was the attack—after the assassination of the elected President there—the attack on his forces by some of the leftist militia that are still there in West Beirut,” Reagan said in off-the-cuff remarks. There was no such attack on Israeli forces.
In Jerusalem, Ambassador Morris Draper, the president’s Mideast representative, was in a rage at the unjustified incursion and demanding an Israeli withdrawal. Reagan’s diary for September 18, 1982, showed him parroting the cover story issued by the Phalangists to hide their murderous rampage. The state-run Voice of Lebanon reported a Phalange statement at 6:30 p.m. It blamed the massacre on the forces of Major Saad Haddad, who controlled a buffer zone between southern Lebanon and Israel. Haddad, a Greek Catholic detested by the Maronite Christians, was financed and controlled by Israel. At the same time, the Phalange denied any involvement in Sabra and Shatila. The statement was dismissed in Jerusalem and Beirut as a bogus and feeble cover-up attempt by the blood-soaked Christian militia. Washington perceived it differently. Based on official information Saturday, September 18, Reagan wrote in his diary: “In Beirut, Haddad’s Christian Phalangist Militia entered a Palestine refugee camp and massacred men, women and children. The Israelis did nothing to halt it.”
The next day during a National Security Council crisis meeting, Reagan still had not grasped Israel’s role as a facilitator of the Phalange invasion of the camps. “The Israelis did finally attempt to oust the killers,” Reagan wrote in his diary. “They have proclaimed their outrage.” Reagan may have been defending Israel so as to defend his support for Jerusalem’s invasion of Lebanon and backing of the Phalange leadership.
Getting their story straight took on more importance as Reagan braced for political criticism of American failures that contributed to the massacre. PLO leader Yasser Arafat spelled it out at a news conference: “I ask Italy, France and the United States: What of your promise to protect the inhabitants of Beirut?” That sort of second-guessing stung some in Washington. “The guilt feeling affected us all,” said Army General John Vessey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger had no such qualms. “I don’t think there’s any connection,” he said when asked about the withdrawal of the multinational force 10 days before the massacre. Philip Habib saw it differently. “The Italian force was right outside those camps,” he said. He had retired—for a second time—earlier that summer after a star-studded career as an ambassador, troubleshooter, and, until his heart gave out, undersecretary of state for political affairs—the number-two post at the State Department. Reagan had summoned him out of retirement to struggle with Israel and Lebanon as his personal representative. Habib’s parents were Maronite Christian immigrants to Brooklyn, the same religion embraced by Bashir Gemayel. It did not help him avoid the bumps, bruises, and bloody noses of the diplomatic minefield that was Israel, Syria, and Lebanon. At least three of his cease-fire agreements vanished in Israeli intransigence. Begin manipulated and Sharon lied. Their willingness to brush off Habib, who carried the implied threat of presidential retribution, reflected confidence in bipartisan support for Israel from 435 US congressional districts. Regardless of Reagan’s—or Habib’s—threats and demands, Begin counted on Congress for an uninterrupted flow of weapons and billions in financial aid.
Habib went home September 1 to huzzahs and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award, at a White House ceremony. His crowning achievement in Beirut—the peaceful removal of Arafat and his PLO army—was soon awash in Palestinian blood. In an interview at his retirement home in San Francisco, he explained how Bashir Gemayel and Sharon pledged to Habib that no harm would befall Sabra, Shatila, and other refugee camps in West Beirut. It was a thin reed at best. The duplicitous Gemayel was plotting a “cleanout” of the camps with Sharon before he was killed. “Sharon was a killer, obsessed by hatred of the Palestinians,” Habib said. “I had given Arafat an undertaking that his people would not be harmed, but this was totally disregarded by Sharon, whose word was worth nothing.” Palestinian old men, women, children, and infants paid the price.
As a result, American influence was at a low ebb when Reagan faced a news conference September 28. It was preceded by Jeane Kirkpatrick, US ambassador to the United Nations, saying the American government shared responsibility for the Beirut massacre, which made Reagan squirm. Helen Thomas of United Press International got right to it.
“Mr. President,” she asked, “when the Palestinian fighters were forced to leave Beirut, they said that they had America’s word of honor that those they left behind would not be harmed. Now comes U.N. Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick, who says that America must share in the blame for these massacres. My question to you is, do you agree with that judgment?”
Reagan slid his answer to responsibility for withdrawal of the multinational force, not the protection of PLO families Thomas asked about: “I don’t think that specifically there could be assigned as a responsibility on our part for withdrawing our troops. They were sent in there with one understanding. They were there to oversee and make sure that the PLO left Lebanon. That mission was completed, virtually without incident, and they left. Then, who could have foreseen the assassination of the President-elect that led to the other violence and so forth.”
Reagan sought to sideline criticism over a premature withdrawal of the multinational force by redeploying American, French, and Italian troops back to Beirut. Although this decision was fraught with consequences, Reagan rushed it through the day after learning of the massacre. He described a September 19 National Security Council meeting in his diary.
“I finally told our group we should go for broke,” Reagan wrote. “Let’s tell the people we are in at the request of the Lebanese—sending the multi-national force back in. Italy has agreed and we believe the French will, too. We are asking the Israelis to leave Beirut. We are asking Arabs to intervene and persuade Syrians to leave Lebanon.… No more half way gestures, clear the whole situation while the [multinational force] is on hand to assure order.… The wheels are now in motion.”
Reagan’s yee-hah tone belied an intense debate over sending too small a force to deal with too big a threat. Perhaps the baseline for such a military commitment was drawn in 1958 by a former five-star Army general, President Dwight D. Eisenhower. When instability and a possible war between Christians and Muslims threatened Lebanon during the Cold War, Eisenhower sent 14,000, a division. Ike instantly outgunned all comers. American troops occupied Beirut for three months.
This time, there were 30,000 Israel Defense Forces troops and armor surrounding Beirut. Syria still had 35,000 troops in Lebanon. In addition to the Christian militas, their ancient Muslim enemy, the Druse, had a well-armed force of 8,000 in the Shuf Mountains overlooking Beirut, and oddball militias with Kalashnikovs set up checkpoints all over the city. Shiites, the poverty-stricken Muslims of the southern suburbs, were being organized into a force called the Amal. Wall posters throughout the Shia neighborhoods showed the image of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of Iran’s “Death to America” campaign. Iran was joining the Lebanese stew in 1982.
Reagan’s National Security Council staff urged him to act like the leader of a superpower instead of putting a multinational force of about 5,000 on the ground. “There were those of us saying that if we’re going to do anything at all, now’s the time to be bold,” said Geoffrey Kemp, a senior staff member. Three American divisions and two French divisions, enough to make up a full-blown armored infantry corps! Not to mention as many as three aircraft carriers and cannon on warships off Beirut harbor. That would be enough brute power, Kemp said, to issue “ultimata to the Israelis and the Syrians to get their forces out of Lebanon.” No simpering requests.
Reagan liked Kemp’s idea. Defense Secretary Weinberger was unalterably opposed. Overruling Weinberger would mean firing one of the oldest members of the Reagan team. The president had no stomach for it. Instead he opted for resending the same 5,000-man force, including about 1,200 US Marines, a celebrated light infantry unit. He announced his decision two days later, and it became an instant political debate. Under the War Powers Act, the Democratic Congress could demand US withdrawal if the Marines came under attack. House Speaker Tip O’Neill quickly raised the issue after Reagan’s September 20 announcement. It was raised again at the September 28 White House news conference.
Q: Mr. President, do you have a plan for getting the United States out of Lebanon if fighting should break out there, or could the Marine presence there lead to another long entanglement such as Vietnam?
The President: No, I don’t see anything of that kind taking place there at all. And the Marines are going in there, into a situation with a definite understanding as to what we’re supposed to do. I believe that we are going to be successful in seeing the other foreign forces leave Lebanon. And then [at] such time as Lebanon says that they have the situation well in hand, why, we’ll depart.
Q: Sir, if fighting should break out again, would you pull the marines out?
The President: You’re asking a hypothetical question, and I’ve found out that I never get in trouble if I don’t answer one of those.…
Q: Mr. President, you’ve told us that you’re sending marines to Lebanon for a limited amount of time, and yet you haven’t told us what the limit is. Can you give us a general idea of how long you expect them to stay there and tell us precisely what you would like to see them accomplish before they withdraw?
The President: I can’t tell you what the time element would be. I can tell you what it is that they should accomplish, and I hope sooner rather than later. One, they’re there along with our allies, the French and the Italians, to give a kind of support and stability while the Lebanese Government seeks to reunite its people. And during this time, while that’s taking place, the withdrawal, as quickly as possible, to their own borders of the Israelis and the Syrians. Now, there we’ve had declarations from both countries that they want to do that. So, I am reasonably optimistic about that.
Q: Are you then saying that they will remain there until all foreign forces are withdrawn?
The President: Yes, because I think that’s going to come rapidly; I think we’re going to see the withdrawal.
Reagan’s optimism was based on the intuition of the most illustrious star in the Republican firmament: George Pratt Shultz, 61, an economist, a professor, a business school dean, a member of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers, a secretary of labor, a director of management and budget, a secretary of the treasury, and president of Bechtel, one of the world’s largest engineering companies. He had an easy manner of a man who worked with students. “That’s Shultz with an h,” he said as I wrote down his name for the first time in 1968. “I had to keep reminding the Marines of that.” He had survived the carnage of the South Pacific as a Marine company commander. It taught him to survive untainted for eight years under President Richard Nixon and the Watergate scandal. Two cabinet colleagues wound up in orange jumpsuits in federal prison. But as Reagan’s new secretary of state, Shultz had stepped on the shifting ground of Israel, Syria, and Lebanon.
“George Shultz, God bless his soul, didn’t know shit from Shinola about the Middle East,” said Alexander Haig, his predecessor.
Because of Bechtel’s global projects, Shultz got to know the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia quite well. Multimillion-dollar projects in the oil-rich desert nation led Bechtel to be an important supporter of Riyadh in Congress. As the corporation’s president, Shultz oversaw Bechtel’s support of the Saudis in the fight for US airborne warning and control (AWAC) jets. Reagan prevailed over intense Israeli opposition in selling the US Air Force planes to Riyadh. In State Department patois, Shultz would be considered an Arabist when it came to Mideast policy. The Arabists were not predisposed to Israel like Reagan and Haig.
Reagan’s first splashy Mideast initiative authored by Shultz had a pro-Arab, anti-Israel flavor. Announced the day after PLO leader Yasser Arafat departed Beirut, Reagan called it a “fresh start” for the Mideast peace process that had stalled with the departure of President Jimmy Carter. It would create a Palestinian homeland on the West Bank and in Gaza that would be supervised by King Hussein of Jordan. There would be a total freeze on new Israeli settlements. Menachem Begin was the first Israeli prime minister to proclaim the West Bank—seized from Jordan in the 1967 war—as ancient Judea and Samaria, part of the Kingdom of Israel that had fallen in 721 BC. The land was the foundation for the future of the greater Land of Israel, “Eretz Israel.” Begin rejected the plan when it was previewed to him before Reagan’s public announcement. So did Arafat, the key beneficiary of Shultz’s largesse.
The “fresh start” vanished in the aftermath of the Sabra and Shatila massacre.