The United States in the Middle East: Interests and Obstacles

By Seth P. Tillman, Indiana University Press. Bloomington, Indiana 1982 333 pp. $22.50

Reviewed by John Gatch

Seth Tillman is no stranger to the foreign affairs community. He was a senior member of the professional staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and is currently Adjunct Professor of International Relations at Georgetown. His new book is a timely and comprehensive review of the Arab-Israel question since 1948 and its impact on U.S. policy, foreign and domestic. Additionally, the earlier history is lightly sketched and the author makes a salient point to which he returns—i.e., there is a contradiction between Zionism and Wilsonian self-determination.

Next, the author discusses American interests in the Middle East in the broad context of the U.S.'s political system. He goes beyond Lord Palmerston's dictum that only interests are eternal. Mr. Tillman's concept is that U.S. national interests encompass principled behavior, regard for the law, loyalty to friends and commitments, ethical restraints, and even ethical imperatives—as well as the seeking of geographical and economic advantages. Under this admittedly idealistic definition, Mr. Tillman describes the U.S.'s four fundamental interests in the Middle East: "reliable access, on reasonable terms, at tolerable prices, to the oil of the region, especially the Arabian Peninsula; the survival and security of the State of Israel; the avoidance of confrontation and advancement of cooperation with the Soviet Union; and the fulfillment, so far as possible, of certain principles, including the peaceful settlement of international disputes, the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory by force, and the right of peoples to self-determination."

Eisenhower Unique

The author describes how Israel and its friends in the U.S. make it difficult for this country to pursue these objectives equally, and points out that only Eisenhower in 1956 has ever successfully blocked this powerful force. He takes us back to the Federalist papers and Madison's strictures against the politics of factions. He speaks of the reintroduction of nationalism into the American political process—essentially a matter of placing in office wiser, more competent leaders.

In discussing U.S.-Saudi relations, Mr. Tillman briefly reviews oil developments and concludes that by and large the Saudis have acted rationally and honorably in their dealings and that, accordingly, we should deal rationally and honorably with them. He also describes the highly charged events surrounding the AWACS sale to Saudi Arabia and the competing efforts of pro-Israeli and pro-Saudi interests to block or to effect the transactions. Implicit in his consideration of U.S.-Saudi relations is the conflict between the U.S.'s support of Israel and its reliance on Saudi oil.

Mr. Tillman examines the role of the Soviet Union in the Middle East and concludes that the U.S. should seek its partnership in any long-range settlement. In his words: "The logic of Soviet-American partnership for a general settlement in the Middle East and the reinforcement of that settlement is the logic of detente itself."

Author's Peace Plan

The last chapter is optimistically entitled "Peace and How to Get It." Mr. Tillman's formula is based on U.N. Resolution 242 and elements of the 1969 "Rogers Plan," which called basically for Israeli withdrawal to the pre-1967 frontiers in exchange for security guarantees. However, Mr. Tillman's effort to tell us how to get peace is anti-climactic for the very reason he so eloquently describes: every U.S. effort to defend and advance U.S. interests in the Middle East has been immediately converted from a foreign to a domestic problem. Mr. Tillman would overcome this difficulty by "a sustained, purposeful campaign by the President and any other elected leaders who might care to step forward to educate the American people in the realities of the Middle East, the nature of American interests to each other and the necessity of a policy that harmonizes these as far as possible. Even more important...would be a new effort, by private citizens no less than public officials, to curb the excesses of the politics of faction, to retrieve the Congress from its recent role as a brokerage of interests to its proper role as a deliberative body committed to the general good, and most important of all, to place in positions of public trust those individuals, in Madison's definition, 'whose enlightened views and virtuous sentiments render them superior to local prejudices and to the schemes of injustice.'"

I sympathize with the author's objectives and applaud his formula for solution but find quaint and almost wistful his exhortation to return to the principles of Madison and Wilson while Israel ruthlessly pursues its own interests with little apparent regard for ours. In this connection, it should be noted that President Reagan's plan (formulated since this book was published) incorporates most of the significant points recommended by the Roger's Plan. But it still remains to be seen whether an American public, however well informed, and an American administration, however determined, can persuade, coerce or by any other means bring Prime Minister Begin and Israel to adopt the President's formula.

Mr. Gatch, president of a Washington, D.C. consulting firm, is a former U.S. foreign service officer.