White House Diary (1 of 3)

Jimmie Carter is the oldest living president of the United States. He may also be

remembered as the last US president who was concerned about world peace, human rights, Israel as a rogue state, social welfare, prevention of environmental degradation, a health system for all, free education, and a more equitable distribution of wealth in his country. Of course he could pursue these goals so long as the system governing the policies of the United States would allow him. The difference between a system, state, or regime and a government has been discussed before. Such regimes employ governments, along with legislative and judicial system, (and in some cases military) to ensure the continuation of policies, to protect it from the silent majority and from other states. Of course, as the regime modifies its policies, some of those apparatuses may not adhere to them, which may lead up to the removal of the instrument from office. That may be the reason for Cater administration not surviving more than one term. Needless to say that he was replaced with one of the most reactionary presidents this country had seen. Of course, we witnessed less qualified and more reactionary presidents since then.

The book, that is the subject of this article, was published three years ago, containing day to day notes of Jimmie Carter in his private diary, during the term of his presidency, and beyond. A large section of the book covers Camp David Accords, which took much of Carter’s time in creating a settlement between Egyptian President Anwar El Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menchem Begin, both assassinated some years later. Although there is a section in this article about Israel, subjects related to Camp David Accords is not covered, and considering numerous other topics covered in this book, a few are categorized and discussed. Due to the high volume of this article, it will also be divided to three parts.

From the time that Carter was a candidate for presidency, he promised to seek world peace and to advocate human rights issues worldwide. His diary reflects as such, through his notes of conversations with dictators installed or supported by the US government, as well as his arm reduction negotiations with the Soviet Union. He even recorded some notes on his willingness to negotiate with Fidel Castro. Invasion of Afghanistan by USSR, popular revolutions in Iran and in Nicaragua, and many other national (Three Mile Island) and international calamities (most notably Iranian hostage crisis) happened during his presidency.

Iran:

Iran's nuclear issue is not a new subject! The former regime of the shah desired to acquire nuclear reactor whereby he established an organization titled Iranian Atomic Energy Organization in purse of this goal:

“I had my follow-up meeting with the shah. We discussed the sale of nuclear reactors to Iran. He’s already bought two and ordered four more from the Germans and two from France, and is going through Paris tomorrow to consider additional purchases from them…This was the beginning of Iran’s nuclear power program, which has now become of worldwide interest and concern. As a signatory of the Nonproliferation Treaty, Iran has a right to have atomic power and also to reprocess uranium to be used as a fuel. The problem is that now Iran appears to be planning to use its highly enriched uranium to build nuclear weapons,” 11/16/1977 (P. 136).

Iranian students uprising abroad (since it was not possible for any opposition inside the country) grew to a large demonstration during shah’s visit to the US. It had some positive and some negative results in the US:

“Chip was attached yesterday on a Texas college campus by Iranian students. He was protected by campus police, a small Secret Service group, and some college football players and black students. The Iranian students are getting out of hand in some cases. They are helping the shah more than they hurt him,” 10/14/1978 (P.252).

“The shah expressed deep concern about whether to set up an interim government, a military government, or perhaps even to abdicate, We encouraged him to hang firm and count on our backing,” 11/1/1978 (P.257).

Events in Iran alarm the president of the shah’s popularity, or lack of, and thinking of possible outcomes:

“We are concerned about the shah’s courage and forcefulness, and he seems to be excessively isolated,” 11/20/1978 (P. 261).

“His ambassador told me there was no concept the shah had given the Iranian people of what he could accomplish. He had no PR program, no advisors to prepare such an effort, and no political structure to succeed if and when elections are held. [Notes for the book] We were in an increasing quandary with respect to the shah. He had been a dependable ally of six presidents who preceded me, and the revolutionary forces opposing him were completely unpredictable. Instead of reaching out to his people and strengthening his control of the government agencies, he was becoming more isolated, oppressive, and ineffective. After much thought and discussion, I decided to give him as much support as possible without directly interfering in the internal affairs of Iran,” 11/21/1978 (P. 261).

It is interesting that Soviets were consulted about the shah. More interesting is the role of Israel:

“I stayed in touch with the Soviets, Israelis, Egyptians, and we’re walking a tightrope in Iran, giving the shah every assurance but encouraging him to be decisive. He’s been just the opposite, which has aggravated an already bad situation,” 12/22/1978 (P. 268).

“The situation in Iran varies from bad to terrible. We instructed [Ambassador William] Sullivan to tell the shah that if he couldn’t form a civilian or military government that would restore peace and reduce bloodshed, to consider a regency council- which means he would have to abdicate. He responded fairly well to this suggestion,” 12/25/1978 (P.268).

Germans and French and British were apparently ready for shah’s departure long before the US government:

“He [Helmut Schmidt- German Chancellor] considered Tehran and Bucharest to be similar, and he had long known that the megalomaniac shah would be brought down,” 1/5/1979 (P. 274).

“[Notes for the book] My three associates at Guadeloupe never had any sympathy for the shah and continued to be more compatible with the revolutionary forces than I,” 1/26/1979 (P.275).

The tipping point to abandon all hopes in the shah and support Khomeini was formed:

“Cy asked me to call Giscard to encourage Khomeini to stay in France and not to go to Iran after the Bakhtiar government is formed, and I agreed,” 1/13/1979 (P. 277).

“…He [Khomeini, para-phrased from Giscard d’Estaing by Carter] is afraid he might lose his life, but his final aim is to overthrow the Bakhtiar government,” 1/14/1979 (P. 278).

“We are pushing hard to keep Khomeini out of Iran, and we have direct contacts with persons on his staff in France,” 1/17/1979 (P. 278).

About forty days later, serious conversation with people surrounding Khomeini started:

“Khomeini sent his representative to pledge increased friendship and cooperation, and to make sure that we were supporting a stable government in Iran. We gave him that assurance,” 2/27/1979 (P. 296).

US support of the new regime in Iran in its full extent:

“I authorized Schlesinger to send a million barrels of kerosene to Iranians,” 7/14/1979 (P. 344).

American hostages confused the policy towards the new regime. However, secret negotiation with pro-west officials that would lead to Iran-Contra affair of many years later was beginning:

“The students are still holding our people with the public approval of the idiot Khomeini,” 11/4/1979. “Although we had assurance from Prime Minister Bazargan and Foreign Minister Yazdi that our hostages would be taken care of and released, they resigned because Khomeini would not permit the action… We also asked the Algerians, Syrians, Turks, Paks, Libyans, PLO, and others to intercede on behalf of the release of our hostages,” 11/6/1979. “The pope agreed to help us with Khomeini but didn’t want publicity,” 11/7/1979 (P. 368).

“[Notes for the book] During the hostage crisis, Hamilton Jordan held a series of clandestine meetings with people inside and close to the Iranian revolution. His reports became my most accurate source of information about what was actually occurring in Iran, and he also provided my best communication with Ayatollah Khomeini and other leaders. Sometimes Ham wore a wig, mustache, and other disguises when he met with his contacts in Paris or other European cities,” 1/25/1980 (P. 395).

After decades of maintaining US interests in Iran, the shah’s service is remembered with the following short and betraying statement (a note to American puppets all over the Middle East, and Iranian opposition groups assisting the US to prepare an invasion of Iran):

“Early in the morning I had a report the shah was dead,” 7/27/1980 (P. 451).

All comes down to ransom:

“I told Christopher in Algeria that the negotiating phase with Iran was over. They had to either take or reject our present proposal,” 12/2/1980 (P. 490).

“The Iranians made a good proposition to us yesterday based on transferring $8.1 billion to the Bank of England. They would then refund all except about $3 billion of it, release the hostages immediately, and solve the rest of the disputes over interest rates and claims through normal process in the future,” 1/16/1981 (Ps. 508 & 509).

And, Khomeini is characterized as such by Reagan, the next president of the US who, himself, is considered affable by Carter:

“Reagan… told a series of anecdotes that were remarkably pointless. The one he considered funniest was about an old man who was asked whether he slept with his beard under or over the covers, and then he couldn’t sleep. He suggested this might be a good punishment for Khomeini for seizing our hostages. I consider him to be affable and a decent man, remarkably old in his attitudes. His life seems to be governed by a few anecdotes and vignettes that he has memorized. He doesn’t seem to listen when anybody talks to him,” 1/19/1981 (P. 513).

Finally, it ends with ridiculing the regime after the US got their hostages back:

“I told them [meeting with American hostages in Europe after they were released] that we had never considered apologizing or paying any ransom, that we had seized between $11 [billion] and 412 billion in Iranian money, and that yesterday after their release we refunded less than $3 billion of it to Iran…I told them I had been worried that they might be angry because we cheated Iran. They laughed,” 1/21/1981 (P. 516). The ones who are not even considered in all these calculations are Iranian people, who have been left for more than three decades with the most primitive and vicious regimes!

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White House Diary- Farra, Straus and Giroux; Copyright 2010 by Jimmy Carter