Israeli Cabinet Action on Wye Accord Offers Chance to Rethink, Alter Ill-Advised U.S. Role in its Implementation

(Washington, D.C.): Approval today of the Wye agreement — on the basis of the vote of a
minority of the Israeli cabinet and subject to a number of conditions which, while reasonable, are
anathema to the PLO — demonstrates the utter artificiality of this accord and the “peace
process” that has spawned it. The ugly truth is that this agreement was brokered for the
convenience of its sponsor, President Clinton, whose consuming preoccupation with his domestic
political circumstances has long driven what passes for his Administration’s foreign policy
agenda.⁽¹⁾ Crushing American pressure produced the accord
in the first place. More crippling
U.S. pressure euchred the Israeli cabinet to vote on it at this juncture. But all the
President’s
pressure and all the President’s expediency-driven manipulations cannot put a genuine
peace together based on the Oslo/Hebron/Wye accords.

The present prospect that the Wye agreement may not be realized to any appreciable degree
offers, however, an opportunity for a reassessment of the role the Central Intelligence Agency is
supposed to play in its implementation. And any honest appraisal of the idea
of assigning the
CIA responsibility for “verifying” the Palestinian Authority’s compliance with its
commitments to fight terrorism will confirm that the U.S. intelligence community must
not
be put into such a position.

The Voice of Experience: Scott Ritter

One of the most astute observations on this issue came from former U.N. weapons inspector
Scott Ritter, who resigned in August over another episode of Clinton Administration politicization
of intelligence — its interference with the work of the United Nations Special Commission for Iraq
(UNSCOM). Maj. Ritter (USMC, Ret.), a Persian Gulf War veteran, made the following remarks
during an interview with The Jerusalem Post on November 3rd:

Question: “I understand you have some concerns regarding the implementation of the
Wye accord?”

Ritter: “Yes, indeed. The accord is to be monitored by the CIA, but the
real
arbiter will be the State Department, and this is a cause for great worry.
The entire effort has been politicized — this is the Clinton administration’s own
Camp David, and they really cannot afford to let it fail. Therefore they
cannot be counted upon to be honest brokers.”

Question: “In what way do you mean dishonest?”

Ritter: “Both because the administration wants the accord to work and
because they are trying to court the moderate Arab countries, they are more
than likely to give the Palestinians slack. For example, if they receive
information from the CIA saying the Palestinians are not complying with the
agreement, they will simply overlook it. The temptation to gloss over things
will be too strong to ignore, because to hold the Palestinians strictly accountable
would endanger the whole process.”

Question: “What has lead you to these conclusions?”

Ritter: “During my time with UNSCOM, it became very clear to me that Iraq
was not being held accountable, and this is an unsettling precedent. The US
makes decisions based on politics, not on honesty, and this leads to
compromises and concessions. I had a bad experience in Iraq which taught me
the U.S. can say one thing, and do another. In addition, I have noted a cooling
towards Israel on the part of the State Department, coupled with an
unrealistic expectation that Arafat can deliver. It is very important for the
U.S. that Arafat not be undermined, and if this means you have to turn a
blind eye to an effective crackdown on Hamas, so be it.“

Question: “Israel has its own ways of monitoring what is going on, and
Netanyahu is not one to allow himself to be bamboozled….”

Ritter: “True, but the Israelis will be faced with so much pressure from the
U.S. and the international community that it will be near impossible to say
‘Wait, the U.S. not being a good monitor.'”

As it happens, the next day, the Wall Street Journal
Europe published an op.ed. article by
the Center for Security Policy’s director, Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., which made a similar point:

“If history teaches anything, it is that the practice of subordinating the business of
objective intelligence-gathering to political priorities corrupts the former and disserves
long-term Western security interests. No one should appreciate this more than Israel,
which has precious little margin for error and knows first-hand that the U.S. is capable
of manipulating intelligence in order to justify defaulting on its commitments to Israel.”

Mr. Gaffney’s essay went on to recount how, in 1970, the United States engaged in the
politicization of intelligence concerning Egyptian military moves in violation of a cease-fire
agreement — actions which translated three years later into the death of many Israeli pilots in the
Yom Kippur war and mortal danger to the Jewish State, itself. href=”#N_2_”>⁽²⁾

Putting the Vital U.S.-Israeli Special Relationship at Risk

In 1994, a distinguished group of retired senior military officers and former civilian officials href=”#N_3_”>⁽³⁾
authored, under the sponsorship of the Center for Security Policy, a powerful warning against yet
another United States government proposal to insert American personnel in the middle of a third
Mideast flashpoint: the Clinton Administration’s idea of deploying U.S. troops onto the
Golan Heights as part of a prospective peace agreement between Israel and Syria. The
following
highlights of this critique (whose quality was so highly acclaimed that it was published in its
entirety in Commentary Magazine) could apply equally well to the Wye accord with
but the
substitution of Yasir Arafat’s “Palestinian Authority” in place of “Syria” and “the CIA’s
verification role” for “the U.S. Golan force”:

• “Strained Relations: The potential for the U.S. Golan force
  to strain relations between the
  United States and Israel would create an incentive for Syria to manufacture situations of
  tension. With U.S. troops on the Golan, the United States would be reluctant to respond to
  Israeli intelligence collection requests if doing so increased the possibility of Israeli preemption
  against Syria. And in any event the United States would be inclined to withhold information
  from Israel if providing it would lead Syria to accuse the United States of favoring Israel or of
  functioning on the Golan effectively as an arm of the IDF.

• “Adverse Repercussions with Syria: Syria would want to use
  strains in its relations with the
  United States to induce U.S. officials to offer concessions to ‘keep Syria in the peace process.’
  Syria can be expected: 1) to exploit its position vis a vis U.S. forces on the Golan to dilute the
  U.S.-Israeli relationship, insisting that the United States act ‘even-handedly’ between Israel and
  Syria and 2) to press the United States to wipe the slate clean regarding such bilateral problems
  as Damascus’ continuing support for terrorism and drug-trafficking.

• “Damage to U.S. Public Support of Israel: Insistence on a
  dangerous deployment of U.S.
  forces on the Golan can be expected to damage Israel’s standing with the U.S. public. If those
  forces suffer casualties — from terrorism, for example — there will be U.S. public pressure to
  end the Golan mission and Israel’s image as a self-reliant ally would be tarnished. Israeli
  anxieties about the reliability of the United States as a “peacekeeper” on the Golan would
  intensify, and with good reason. U.S. credibility would be at stake.”

The Bottom Line

It is extremely ill-advised for the United States, for Israel and for their important bilateral
relationship to put American personnel — and interests — in such jeopardy. “Sources and
methods” of intelligence collection will inevitably be compromised; U.S. efforts to penetrate and
counteract PLO-affiliated terrorist organizations will be impaired; and Israel’s confidence in
America’s reliability when it comes to safeguarding sensitive Israeli information and supporting its
anti-terrorist and other defensive operations can only suffer. For all these reasons, the
Clinton
Administration should stop coercing Israel into formally adopting and implementing the
Wye accord and should stop compounding this mistake by inserting American intelligence
personnel into so fatally flawed an undertaking.

– 30 –

1. See Clinton Legacy Watch # 32: ‘Wimpy diplomacy’
— ‘I’ll Gladly Pay You Tuesday’ for a
Signing Ceremony Today (No. 98-D 172, 13
October 1998).

2. For more on this dark chapter in U.S.-Israeli relations, see
Mission Impossible: Wye Deal
Poses Threat to U.S. Intelligence — As Well As Israeli Security, American
Interests (No. 98-D
178, 30 October 1998).

3. The authors of this study, entitled U.S. Forces on
the Golan Heights: An Assessment of
Benefits and Costs were, General John Foss (USA, Ret.), Commanding General,
Training and
Doctrine Command 1989-91; General Al Gray (USMC, Ret.), Commandant, U.S. Marine Corps
1987-91; Lieutenant General John S. Pustay (USAF, Ret.), President, National Defense
University 1981-83; General Bernard Schriever (USAF, Ret.), Commander, U.S. Air Force
Systems Command 1959-66; Admiral Carl Trost (USN, Ret.), Chief of Naval Operations
1986-90; Admiral Elmo R. Zumwalt, Jr. (USN, Ret.), Chief of Naval Operations 1970-74;
Douglas J. Feith, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense 1984-86; Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., Deputy
Assistant Secretary of Defense 1983-87; Richard Perle, Assistant Secretary of Defense for
International Security Policy 1981-87; Eugene V Rostow, Director, Arms Control and
Disarmament Agency 1981-83; Henry S. Rowen, Assistant Secretary of Defense for International
Security Affairs 1989-91.