The Twilight War: The Secret History of America's Thirty-Year Conflict with Iran (38 page)

Sheik Ali Khalifa’s call set in motion yet one more debate within an administration still struggling with its Middle East foreign policy in the wake of Iran-Contra. While the basic tenets of containing Soviet and Iranian expansion were never questioned, there were divisions about whether this unexpected
Kuwaiti overture helped these goals. In a private memo for senior officials, Shultz summed up his views: “It is not the role of the United States to take the lead in protecting neutral shipping in the Gulf.”
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Overall, the State Department remained hesitant about rushing in and accepting the Kuwaiti request. It appeared to be little more than a blatant attempt to pressure the United States into saving Kuwait’s economy with very little in return.
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Once again, Weinberger clashed with Shultz. The United States had a request for assistance in an area vital to American security, Weinberger argued, and this presented a grand opportunity to develop the closer military ties needed for U.S. security—what the New Splendor effort envisioned. Inaction risked undermining the U.S. position in the Persian Gulf and would open the Persian Gulf door to the Soviets.
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As to the legalities of reflagging, the secretary of defense asserted that whether the ships were under U.S. registry or not was immaterial. If we decided to safeguard Kuwaiti ships, he asserted, we could do it because it was in our interests and served to ensure our principle of freedom of the seas. “There wasn’t the slightest question about propriety of the request and the purpose of our helping them,” Weinberger said of his position. “It was in international waters, we and everyone needed the oil, so why not do it?”
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Although Weinberger later said the Iran-Contra debacle had not influenced his decision, Richard Armitage and Robert Oakley on the NSC staff both viewed the Kuwaiti request through the lens of the scandal. “This presented a golden opportunity to assist the moderate Arabs and restore U.S. reliability after Iran-Contra, having devastated them by lying,” said Armitage.
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Oakley agreed, adding that the U.S. policy was in tatters and the fear of an Iranian victory was serious.
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Sheik Ali Khalifa’s request offered Washington the opportunity to clearly demonstrate American support for our allies in the Gulf and to show which side we were on regarding Iran.
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inter soon gave way to spring with still no firm American commitment to Kuwait.

Finally a frustrated Kuwait dropped a bombshell. Sheik Abdul Fattah al-Bader of the Kuwait Oil Tanker Company announced to startled American diplomats that Kuwait and the Soviet Union had reached an agreement to reflag five tankers, to be manned entirely by Soviet crews and escorted by three
Soviet warships between Khor Fakkan, UAE, and Kuwait.
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The Kuwaiti government still wanted to proceed with registering six ships with the Americans, but the Soviets had been much more responsive. The entire process would take just one week, as opposed to twenty weeks with the U.S. Coast Guard.

This news created consternation on the third floor of the Pentagon. Sandy Charles, director for Middle Eastern affairs, drafted a memo for Weinberger for his weekly breakfast meeting the next morning with Carlucci and Shultz.
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She recommended that the United States offer to protect all eleven of the tankers in question—including the five offered to Moscow—regardless of coast guard paperwork or even if they flew the Stars and Stripes.
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The next morning, Weinberger broke the logjam. The United States risked an expanded Soviet military presence in the Gulf if it failed to act. We cannot sit by and allow the Iranians to intimidate Kuwait, he said. While Carlucci concurred, Shultz remained unconvinced. After an hour of debating, Weinberger called the president directly. Reagan agreed to protect all eleven Kuwaiti tankers.
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Weinberger immediately sent a letter to the Kuwaiti defense minister, Sheik Salem al-Sabah:

The U.S. government immediately pressed Kuwait to renege on its deal with the Soviets. But now Sheik Salem and the Kuwaitis had the upper hand. After berating the Americans for their foot-dragging and their overly complicated bureaucracy, Salem added that he resented their request for the Kuwaitis to alter their policy decisions. After all, he said, “Kuwait is a sovereign country.”

As far as reneging on their deal with the Soviets, he said, “Where there is a will, there is a way.” But Sheik Salem then cautioned, “In England, once a man had proposed to a woman, he could not back out, and this was the situation between Kuwait and Moscow.”

The American deputy consul, James Hooper, deftly countered, “It was not official until the man put a ring on the woman’s finger. Had Kuwait put a ring on the Russian finger?”
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“Let us say that our hand is reaching toward their hand,” Sheik Salem slyly replied, “but the ring has not yet been placed on the Russian finger.”

On March 9, Ali Khalifa telephoned Crist in Tampa after a meeting with Crown Prince Saad. The Kuwaiti government had agreed not to take the Russian bride. It accepted the U.S. offer to protect all eleven Kuwaiti tankers. Kuwait had slipped the ring onto the American finger.
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Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff William Crowe arrived in Bahrain for scheduled meetings with the emir and the commander of Middle East Force, Rear Admiral Harold Bernsen, prior to going to Kuwait to consummate the agreement. After landing, Crowe learned that Khalifa had not been entirely honest. Kuwait still intended to charter three Soviet tankers to carry some of its crude oil. The revelation blindsided Crowe.
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“Should we just rescind the offer and let Kuwait fend for itself against Iran? Let Kuwait make the best deal it can with the Soviets?” Crowe asked Bernsen. The chairman generally supported the reflagging idea, but privately shared many of Shultz’s concerns. He was also not an admirer of Kuwait’s aloof stance toward the United States and had little sympathy for its straddling the fence between the superpowers.

“I think it’s too late, sir,” said Bernsen. “Backtracking now would seriously undermine American credibility with the other GCC countries.”
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When an angry Crowe finally calmed down, he agreed with Bernsen. There was little the United States could do except move forward and try to mitigate the Soviet’s newfound prominence in the Persian Gulf.
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Kuwait had deftly manipulated both superpowers into providing protection against Iran. Kuwait had agreed to put the ring on the American finger, while leaving the door open for its Russian mistress.

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ith the political decision made, CENTCOM ramped up its plans to protect the eleven Kuwaiti tankers. Around six p.m. on Friday, March 6, Crist called his operations officer, Air Force Major General Samuel Swart, to get the “board of directors together,” as the commander called his key staff officers.
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At their meeting two hours later, Crist informed them of the proposed reflagging operation, which had been given the randomly selected
name “Private Jewels.” Washington’s guidance to Crist had been to “minimize the risk to American lives” but still be prepared to launch retaliatory strikes on Iran within ninety-six hours.

Several shortfalls plagued CENTCOM for the upcoming convoy operation. Not only did it have no off-the-shelf plan, but Crist had no senior navy subordinate command to run what would certainly be a naval mission.
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Lieutenant General Robert Kingston tried and failed to get the navy to stand up a Fifth Fleet for CENTCOM, and now Crist’s sea service component consisted of a frocked rear admiral in Hawaii who handled budgets and paperwork. The heavy lifting of the operation fell to the small Persian Gulf flotilla, Middle East Force. Established in 1949, it consisted of a flagship and a few destroyers based out of Bahrain in an old British naval facility.
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The navy never intended this to be anything more than a small show-the-flag naval force. In the event of a Middle East conflict, the four-star commander in Hawaii’s Pacific Fleet would roll in and take over. The establishment of a joint military command legally responsible for the Middle East had not changed the U.S. Navy’s scheme. CENTCOM could fight the land battle in Iran, but the Pacific Fleet would control the warships, perhaps in support of CENTCOM, but ultimately unilaterally and irrespective of the wishes of the commander in Tampa.

The commander of Middle East Force was not the type of admiral the institution would have chosen for such an important operation. Rear Admiral Harold Bernsen had graduated from Dartmouth, not the Naval Academy; an aviator but no “Top Gun” fighter jock, he had flown decidedly unglamorous airborne warning surveillance prop planes. Still, Bernsen knew the Persian Gulf. He had commanded the Middle East flagship, USS
La Salle
, at the outbreak of the Iran-Iraq War, and had recently served as Crist’s senior planning officer at CENTCOM, where he’d earned Crist’s respect. What Bernsen lacked in naval career gravitas, he made up for with political acumen. With a calm, measured persona that appealed to Gulf leaders, Bernsen understood the Arabs as few other military officers did. He was a smart and unorthodox thinker in the most conservative of the services. A skilled envoy, he forged a strong bond with the emirs and kings of the Gulf. This was a mission that would be political as much as military. While he never enjoyed the confidence of the navy hierarchy, especially the chief of naval operations, Admiral Carlisle Trost, Bernsen proved to be a perfect choice. Bernsen’s operations
officer, Captain David Grieve, arrived in Tampa to assist CENTCOM’s planning. Working late into the night over the next few days, they hashed out a concept for the upcoming escort operation.

On March 13, General Crist briefed the chiefs in the Tank on their plan. Crist envisioned an expansion of the basic regime already under way since the boarding of the
President Taylor.
One or two U.S. warships would accompany the tankers along a six-hundred-mile route running from Khor Fakkan just outside the Gulf to Kuwait Harbor. CENTCOM requested two additional ships (bringing the Middle East Force total to eight) to protect the tankers and maintain communications links with air force AWACS in Saudi Arabia and the carrier well out in the Gulf of Oman.
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On Sunday, March 22, Bernsen’s staff met for the first time with Kuwaiti oil officials and embassy representatives to talk about the escort plan. Bernsen did not have the ships to run a continual shuttle, but two or three ships could be gathered together at either end and then escorted the entire six-hundred-mile route. This slowed oil deliveries, al-Bader said, but he had little choice but to agree to the American plan. They quickly agreed on several southern Gulf routes for the convoys that avoided the Iranian exclusion zone, and Kuwait agreed to allow an American naval officer to be stationed in the Kuwait Oil Tanker Company headquarters to serve as a liaison officer. Armed with a satellite telephone, he would coordinate the tankers’ schedules with Middle East Force. Additionally, al-Bader agreed to allow an officer to be stationed on board each tanker during the convoy. Kuwait agreed to purchase short-range walkie-talkies for these officers to communicate with the escorting warships. Their job would be to advise the tanker captains on military matters and to serve as coordinators between the civilian masters and the convoy commander.

Tehran greeted news of the Kuwaiti escort arrangement with characteristic vitriol. President Khamenei said Kuwait’s request for U.S. protection “dishonored the region” and warned that Kuwait City and its oil facilities lay within range of Iranian forces. “Iran has not yet used its capabilities to bring pressure on Kuwait,” said the Iranian president and future supreme leader on April 27.
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In addition to its diminutive navy, Iran had other military options. In August 1986, an Iranian naval officer, Commodore Kanoush Hakimi, traveled to China to negotiate a secret deal to purchase the powerful Chinese-built
Silkworm antiship cruise missiles. While guided by a relatively unsophisticated radar, these potato-shaped missiles packed a thousand-pound warhead capable of seriously damaging any supertanker or sinking any American warship. The Chinese agreed to sell twelve launchers and as many as one hundred missiles, and soon more Iranians arrived for training on the new weapon.
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American intelligence learned immediately of the sale. Hakimi happened to be on the CIA’s payroll. Additionally, the British spy service, MI6, may have had an agent working the case. An Iranian arms merchant, Jamshid Hashemi, claimed to have negotiated the $452 million deal during ten chaotic rounds of haggling in China in 1985–1986. During that period, he worked for British intelligence, meeting with his Persian-speaking handler, “Michael,” once a week in London.
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The British government passed his information along to the CIA.

In a Pentagon meeting, Weinberger confronted his Chinese counterpart, who simply denied sending the missiles to Iran. “We’ve got satellites photographing the first shipment leaving China and off-loading at Bandar Abbas,” replied the incredulous defense secretary.
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