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Crawford recalled that Ben-Gurion's reply was long, evasive, and did not agree to the IAEA inspection of Dimona. |
William R. Crawford was a young foreign service officer appointed as director of Israeli affairs by the State Department shortly after John F. Kennedy's inauguration. He was asked to draft a letter from the President to David Ben-Gurion emphasizing that America's worldwide position on nonproliferation would be compromised if Israel pursued an independent course. The letter also demanded inspection of Dimona and the right to convey the results to Gamal Abdel Nasser to prevent Egypt from beginning its own nuclear research.1
Crawford recalled that Ben-Gurion's reply was long, evasive, and did not agree to the International Atomic Energy Agency inspection of Dimona. Crawford also noted that his draft of the letter was rewritten by George Ball's office, which held onto it for days, eventually provoking a complaint from the White House.1
Footnotes
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Hersh, Seymour M. The Samson Option: Israel's Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign Policy. Random House, 1991. Chapter 8. ↩︎