On 25 October 1958, the last of the American Forces which had landed in Lebanon voluntarily departed. It is now possible to evaluate the American landings in Lebanon and to draw certain conclusions from this experience of a joint diplomatic and military enterprise. Although no guns were fired in anger and no casualties were inflicted upon the indigenous population, this was, in fact, an exercise in limited war. The objectives which were achieved were not only in the interest of Lebanon and of the United States, but also of the world through the maintenance of peace.
Although written from a U. S. Marine’s point of view—therefore very partial—the account of “Operation Bluebat” by Brigadier General Sydney S. Wade, which appeared in the Marine Corps Gazette of July 1959, does present an account of the strictly military operations. In the Editor’s Note to General Wade’s article, it was stated that, “This ac
count of the landings, written for Gazette readers, contains only that political background considered necessary for an understanding of the military aspects of the operation.” In paraphrase, it might be said that the present narration will contain only that military background considered necessary for an understanding of the political aspects of the operations. It should be of interest to military students, however, to examine in some detail a case study of limited war in which the application of force was specifically tailored to the achievement of political objectives.
II
Before considering the actual history of the American landings in Lebanon, it is first essential to have some background as to what happened in the summer of 1958, and who American Forces eventually intervened at the city of Beirut.
The Secretary of State, in conversation with an Allied ambassador in Washington, summarized the Lebanese crisis succinctly in one sentence when he said that the insurrection in Lebanon was made up of two factors: outside intervention, plus the internal problem of whether or not President Chamoun would, or should, succeed himself in office for a second term.
On this latter aspect of the problem, the Lebanese Constitution forbids a president immediately succeeding himself for a second six-year term of office. In consequence, had the outgoing president decided to stand for re-election, it would have required a constitutional amendment, which can be voted by a two-thirds majority of the Lebanese Parliament. As for popular opinion on the much discussed issue of whether President Camille Chamoun should attempt such an amendment of the constitution as a prerequisite to re- election, the country was almost evenly divided, with a large proportion of the Moslem population opposed and an equal number of the Christian population in favor. This broad division of opinion was infinitely subdivided, but for the purposes of this study it is not necessary to go into greater detail. From the aspect of the diplomatic problem, however, it should be mentioned that many of the Moslems who opposed the President were strong Arab nationalists, and were embittered at President Chamoun’s having espoused the Eisenhower Doctrine, as well as having earlier refused to sever relations with Great Britain and France following the episode at Suez in 1956. As for the proponents of President Chamoun, it was important to note that the influential Lebanese emigres colonies in the Western Hemisphere were wholly for the President, and that a variety of governments friendly to the United States, including Turkey, Iraq, Iran, and Jordan, felt that President Chamoun merited support.
On 8 May 1958, a left-wing editor of the Beirut newspaper Telegraph was murdered by unknown assailants. Rioting broke out in the city of Tripoli on the next day. This was Lebanon’s second largest center of population, with a Moslem majority much opposed to the prospect of a second term for President Chamoun. During the next few days, the street fighting in Tripoli grew more severe with mounting casualties and in the capital of Beirut, a general strike was declared in the Moslem quarter, called the Basta. Already it was evident that the insurgents were receiving help from outside Lebanon, principally in the form of funds, with a considerable incursion of clandestine arms. There was also a violent campaign of denunciation of President Chamoun by the Damascus and Cairo radios and press: one more instance of what this writer has called “audio-visual aggression.”
Although the insurrection was but three days old, already on 11 May, President Chamoun commented to the American Ambassador on the remark of his Foreign Minister, Dr. Malik, that the government of Lebanon should begin to think tentatively of asking the United States for the landing of a division of Marines. Two days later, as the revolution spread and the central government increasingly lost control over the internal security situation, the beleaguered President summoned the Ambassadors of the United States, the United Kingdom, and France. He indicated that his strife torn country might have to ask for military assistance from the three friendly powers.
The American Government was convinced from evidence at hand that there had, in fact, been serious outside intervention in the Lebanese civil war. It also felt that the maintenance of the independence of a small free country such as Lebanon was important if world peace were to be maintained, and if the integrity of other states was not to be violated with impunity. In consequence, on 14 May, the American Ambassador was authorized to inform the Lebanese President that although Lebanon should not invoke American assistance unless its integrity were generally threatened and its own forces were not sufficient for the protection of the state, nevertheless the United States was prepared, upon request both from the President and the government of Lebanon, to send certain combat forces which would have the dual mission of protecting American life and property, and of assisting the government of Lebanon in its military program for the preservation of the integrity and independence of the Republic. At the same time, the United States would expect that Lebanon would file a complaint with the United Nations Security Council against external interference in its internal affairs; that at least some Arab states would be prepared publicly to support Lebanon in its appeal for aid; and, finally, that if the United States assisted it would not be on the issue of the internal question of the Lebanese presidential election.
III
The civil war in Lebanon rapidly assumed the proportions of an armed stalemate. The rebels controlled most of the Moslem city of Tripoli in the north, much of the Moslem town of Saida in the south, the Moslem center of Beirut, and large areas in the Bekaa Valley contiguous with Syria and in the mountainous central region of the Chouf, where the Druzes of Kamal Jumblat had been reinforced by a band of six hundred fellow tribesmen from Syria. The daily pay of the insurgent forces came by various subterranean channels. There probably were at maximum between five and seven thousand armed men on the insurgent side, with a small but significant cadre in Tripoli, Beirut, and, to a lesser degree, the Chouf, made up of non-coms and a few officers from an adjacent Arab country. The bulk of the fighting forces on the rebel side were Lebanese, however. Some were imbuded with a definite political fixation against the supposed intent of President Chamoun to succeed himself; others fitted Dr. Johnson’s dictum that “the last refuge of a scoundrel is patriotism”; and others were out for whatever advantage, pecuniary or otherwise, they might stand to pick up. For example, when an American television correspondent interviewed a peasant fighter, and asked why he was fighting, the Arabic interpreter replied for the man, “I am fighting for liberty and against tyranny.” But actually, what the trooper had said in Arabic was more brief— “I am fighting for money.”
On the government side there were civilian partisans of President Chamoun, armed from a variety of sources, while the regularly constituted forces of the state, consisting of the army and the gendarmerie, intervened largely for the purpose of keeping open certain essential lines of communications, or of preventing rebel sorties from their strongholds in Tripoli, the Basta and the Chouf, but without at the same time making any determined endeavor to crush the rebellion. The Lebanese army was but a reflection of the population mosaic of the country, made up almost equally of Christians and Moslem troops. The Commander-in- Chief, General Chehab, feared that if he ordered his forces to destroy the rebel strongholds, his army might divide on a strictly Moslem versus Christian axis, with the result that the country would then be plunged into a most bloody internecine conflict, with forces on both sides possessed of ample weapons and the necessary military techniques and discipline mutually to destroy each other. The upshot of this uneasy military balance was by mid-summer a stalemate, with much of the area of Lebanon in rebel control, but with the government forces maintaining open both longitudinal and lateral lines of communication, as well as free access to the port and airport of Beirut.
IV
With the contingent assurances of military support from the Western powers under the conditions which had been outlined to the President, joint planning was begun by the British and American military on a standby basis in the event that the President and government of Lebanon should call for Allied assistance. Also, at this time a new command was set up for the first time in American history called a Specified Command, later to be known as CinCSpeCoME, or Commander- in-Chief, Specified Command, Middle East. CinCSpeCoME was entrusted to the experienced hands of Admiral James L. Holloway, Jr., who already wore the hat of CinCNELM, based in London, England.
V
On 6 June the Lebanese Foreign Minister lodged before the U.N. Security Council an official complaint of interference in the internal affairs of Lebanon by the United Arab Republic. On 11 June, the Security Council voted to send observers to Lebanon and the first of these neutral officers arrived on 12 June. The rapidly expanded U.N. Observer Group, dubbed UNOGIL, was unarmed and initially much limited in terms of transport, although eventually it did acquire light observation planes and helicopters. Since, as has been indicated above, most of the country was already in rebel hands, these unarmed observers were confined largely to the few principal highways still kept open by the Lebanese security forces. In consequence, their reports to the Secretary General of the United Nations revealed little to substantiate
The author criticizes the "inflexibility” of the military orders which sent Marines ashore precisely at 1500 hours, local time, on 15 July, to secure Beirut’s airport. Not even a personal plea from the Ambassador, stating that the life of Lebanon’s President Chamoun was threatened, could alter the prearranged military time-table the claim of the Lebanese government of “massive” military intervention from Syria. By lodging its complaint with the Security Council, however, the Lebanese government had already fulfilled one of the conditions precedent to possible allied military intervention, if that government should so request.
One other of the conditions laid down when the American Ambassador, on 14 May, had communicated his government’s readiness to consider assistance to the Lebanese government was that an appeal for help to maintain the integrity of the Republic must emanate not only from the President, but likewise from the government of Lebanon. Here again this condition was placed in readiness to be met. On 16 June, the Lebanese Cabinet unanimously voted full powers to the President to call for the military assistance of friendly powers if, in his judgment, he felt the integrity of the state could be saved by no other means.
As for the third condition, that the government of Lebanon have the support of at least some other Arab governments, this was readily and even urgently, forthcoming from the government of Iraq and from the government of the Kingdom of Jordan.
As for the issue of the presidential elections, President Chamoun had many times declared confidently to the American Ambassador that this was no longer an issue; his only concern was for the preservation of the integrity and independence of the state.
Thus, by mid-June, one month after the President of Lebanon had placed the three friendly Western powers on notice that he might find himself compelled to ask for military intervention, the conditions precedent to such a step had, so far as the government of Lebanon was concerned, been fulfilled. So far as the American government was concerned, however, there was deep concern lest the United States be asked to intervene in a situation where, in effect, the arrival of our forces would be construed as intervention in a purely internal conflict centered upon a struggle for continuance in office. There was likewise no desire in Washington to see American troops deployed on the beaches of Beirut if the Lebanese armed forces themselves were not attempting to put down the conflict or if, even worse, the Lebanese armed forces might resist an American or an allied landing. On several occasions these apprehensions were made known, not only to President Chamoun, but to the Lebanese Commander-in-Chief, General Chehab.
VI
The situation radically changed on 14 July, 1958. What had heretofore concerned only an internal struggle in Lebanon, abetted by outside intervention, became but one aspect of a wider crisis affecting the entire Near East. On the morning of 14 July the government of Nuri Said and the royal family of Iraq were destroyed by a coup d’état under the leadership of Brigadier Abdel Karim Kasem. Washington had very reliable information that a similar coup d’état had been scheduled against King Hussein of Jordan for 17 July. In consequence, when on the morning of 14 July President Chamoun separately summoned the chiefs of mission of the United States, the United Kingdom, and France, his appeal for instant military intervention was reflected against a much broader background, namely, the map of the Near East.
President Chamoun asked for American intervention within 48 hours on the mistaken intelligence, derived from newspapers, that the Sixth Fleet was largely deployed on the coasts of Spain and could not reach the Levant in a shorter time. His requests of the British Charge and the French Ambassador were for aid within 24 hours. By arrangement between the powers concerned, however, it was decided that only American forces would land in Lebanon; the British were to respond to a similar appeal from the government of Jordan. Ultimately, the French desire for a “token” participation was skilfully met with no untoward repercussions when on 17 July the French cruiser De Grasse, wearing the flag of Vice Admiral Jozan, with escorting destroyers, called at Beirut and departed during the night.
President Chamoun’s request for American military intervention was met with extreme celerity by the U. S. government. Far from landing within 48 hours, as the President had asked, within the space of 20 hours the American Ambassador was empowered to inform the President that U. S. Marines would commence their disembarkation at Beirut at 1500 hours, local time, 15 July. The Ambassador was instructed to add that the United States would expect “full co-operation from the Lebanese armed forces.”
At the request of President Chamoun, the American Ambassador imparted the news of the forthcoming American landings to General Chehab at 1330 on 15 July. The General told the Ambassador that the Lebanese were on the brink of disaster, and asked if the American troops could at least stay on board their ships, which might then enter the Port of Beirut. This word was passed to the senior American officer present, as well as to the Marine lieutenant colonel who was in immediate command of the troops landing to secure the airport beachhead. The lieutenant colonel was bound by extremely inflexible orders and had no option but to carry out his securing of the airport. The senior officer present, a naval captain who was “Commodore” of the APA’s and AKA’s which disembarked the initial landing force, also considered himself bound by orders which could not be amended, even at the request of the Ambassador. This captain, in fact, informed the Ambassador that he “was subject to the orders of the Commander of the Sixth Fleet, who in turn was subject to the orders of ComCinCSpeCoME, who in turn was subject to the orders of the Chief of Naval Operations, who in turn was subject to the orders of the President of the United States.” Although this was an accurate description of the naval chain of command, it was in no way responsive to the critical need of the situation which called for a flexible approach, particularly in view of the fact that many elements in the Lebanese Army were at that moment preparing to resist the American landing by force.
Another episode on the day of the landings served to underscore the requirement for at least some latitude of leadership in a military operation of the nature of limited war which was undertaken for political objectives. Shortly before three o’clock on the day of the landings, the President of Lebanon telephoned the American Ambassador, saying that he had word of an army plot to assassinate him, with zero hour fixed at 1500. President Chamoun said, “I want you to send Marines with tanks now!” The Ambassador at once sent runners to the airport, but again found that the Marine lieutenant colonel in charge had his mimeographed orders with a specific timetable, and that he did not feel he had latitude to depart from these rigid instructions in response to the Ambassador’s request for help. When the Marine commander, in consequence, made a negative response, the Ambassador had no other recourse than to take up the problem with the Lebanese Commander- in-Chief, General Chehab, who promised that he would take immediate measures to frustrate any attempt on the life of President Chamoun. That these measures proved successful in no way diminishes the risk which was run, nor the possible consequences if, in fact, the President of Lebanon had been assassinated while the U. S. Marines had landed and, according to the traditional doctrine, “had the situation well in hand.”
On the morning of 16 July, the Marine forces on shore had orders to proceed into the port area of Beirut from their beachhead at the Khalde Airport. The Embassy discovered, however, that most of the available artillery and armor of the Lebanese army garrison of Beirut had been lined up along the airport road, with guns placed for enfilade fire in a T-formation crossing the main route of access down which the approaching Marine column of tanks and amphibious personnel carriers were to move. At the direct request of the American Ambassador, the senior commander on shore, Brigadier General Sydney Wade, despite the extreme rigidity of his instructions, agreed to withhold the deployment of his forces into Beirut for one hour. In this breathing spell the Ambassador, who had called on President Chamoun and General Chehab at the presidential palace, suggested that he and the General should go out to the guns in an effort to forestall what might have been a highly explosive situation.
The Ambassador and the Lebanese Commander-in-Chief thereupon drove out to the airport road, where they found the Lebanese artillery and armor opposing the halted column of Marines. At this juncture, the American Commander-in-Chief, Admiral Holloway, accompanied by Rear Admiral H. A. Yeager, arrived from the flagship USS Taconic, and the Ambassador was able to place the two military commanders in direct contact to resolve the crisis. The American diplomatic representative likewise fulfilled the more humble office of interpreter.
The American commander and the Ambassador, with General Chehab, then repaired to a nearby army physical training school which had direct telephone connections with the General Staff. Here the Commander-in- Chief gave the necessary instructions to disperse the Lebanese armor and artillery, and to make arrangements for the peaceful entry into the Beirut port area of the Marine landing force.
Although it was subsequently ascertained that the Lebanese units had local orders to fire on the Marines, this was not an instruction from the Commander-in-Chief or, above all, the Lebanese President and government, who had requested friendly U. S. intervention. The deployment of the Lebanese armor and tanks in this threatening attitude had been the insubordinate act of certain younger officers in the armor and artillery. The impact of this act of insubordination on the political aspects of the American landing might well have jeopardized the objectives for which both the diplomats and the military were working.
It is a credit to the command on both sides that, despite this near miss, very cordial and effective working relationships were promptly established between Admiral Holloway and General Chehab, and throughout the lower echelons in the American and Lebanese command structure. In fact, by the very evening of 16 July, military patrols composed of Lebanese and American units were jointly operating on the streets of Beirut.
Although the Marine Corps landing occupied the principal attention in General Wade’s military narration of the American landings in Lebanon, an equally important military role was assigned to units of the 24th Airborne Brigade, under command of Brigadier General David Gray, U. S. Army, and eventually to an entire battalion of tanks which had been deployed from Germany. The overall military command of land forces was in the hands of Major General Paul Adams, U. S. Army, who relieved Brigadier General Wade, U. S. Marine Corps on 26 July. The total number of American forces eventually deployed in the vicinity of Beirut came close to 15,000, of which 8,000 were U. S. Army, and about 6,000 Marines.
Full credit is likewise due to the U. S. Air Force, whose planes transported the units of the 24th Airborne Brigade, and elements of whose 19th Air Force carried out their missions successfully.
The U. S. Navy in the Sixth Fleet, with ancillary elements brought from elsewhere as required, did a magnificent job in supplying the logistic requirements of the troops onshore. In fact, to the Arab observer, the seemingly effortless ease with which so important an operation was conducted, and the smooth synchronization of the three military elements of air, land, and sea which was maintained gave dramatic proof, not only of the determination of the United States to fulfill its political objectives, but of the highly disciplined means it used to achieve these ends.
A fourth element lay in the diplomatic arm. It is quite possible that the landings would have been opposed, and the course of events had a different outcome, had not the American Embassy been fully conversant of what was going on, and had it not intervened at the critical time to prevent untoward events from coming to pass. On a continuing basis, the confident relationship which was instantly established between Admiral Holloway, as CinCSpeCoME, and General Adams, as Commander of the Land Forces, and with the American Ambassador and his staff" made possible a smooth day-by-day direction of the American military presence in Lebanon. So confident and complete was this relationship among the higher echelons of official Americans operating in Lebanon that at no time was there any difference of opinion between the Ambassador and the Commander-in-Chief. There was, therefore, no necessity to invoke the paragraph of the joint Defense-State directive to the Commander-in-Chief, which states that, “In case of difference between the military commander and the local United States diplomatic representative in regard to political matters relating exclusively to Lebanon, the views of the latter shall be controlling.”
The American landing in Lebanon and the British air envelopment in Jordan were undoubtedly decisive in preventing the wiping out of the Lebanese and Jordanian governments by force in a manner similar to that of the Iraqi government in Baghdad. In consequence, it can be fairly said that this limited use of force was successful in achieving the political objective, which was to maintain peace in the Middle East and to show the world generally that the United States and Great Britain, with the support of their allies, were ready to go to great effort and risk to assist small, free, friendly nations to maintain their integrity and independence.
VII
Scarcely had the Marine amtracs hit the beach and the Air Force Hercules transports landed their troops, weapons, and cargo at the airport than Admiral Holloway and the Ambassador in Beirut, and the Defense and State Departments in Washington began to plan for the withdrawal of the American Forces from Lebanon.
One of the greatest concerns which had haunted both the diplomatic and military officers in responsible positions was the possibility that once our forces were landed in the Near East they might be forced indefinitely to remain. The past history of military incursions into the Levant since the time of Alexander the Great gave ample reason to sustain such an apprehension. In fact, in the entire history of Phoenicia, which goes back some five thousand years, no foreign invading army had ever come by invitation of the inhabitants, or had left voluntarily without causing casualties to the inhabitants.
As the security situation in Lebanon became stabilized, it was possible for the Lebanese Parliament to meet in plenary session, deputies both of the rebel and of the loyalist factions voting for. a new President. The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, General Fouad Chehab, received the necessary two-thirds majority and was elected on 31 July. On the same day the U. S. Secretary of State announced that U. S. forces would be withdrawn from Lebanon as soon as the Lebanese government requested their removal. The President-elect, in his first message to the Lebanese people, stated that foremost among national objectives was the withdrawal of foreign troops. In consequence, there was agreement in principle on both sides, Lebanese and American, that our forces should leave as soon as possible. General Chehab himself, however, indicated that he would not request withdrawal until the security situation had improved.
From the diplomatic point of view it seemed essential that the initiative for withdrawal should remain in American hands. Nationalistic Arab radio and press attacks could not in that case successfully allege that the American landings were an exercise in imperialism. As a matter of fact, if the Americans kept the initiative, they would prove to the world that this was a case of “imperialism in reverse.”
Even before the new President took office on 23 September, the phased withdrawal of the American forces had begun. The 2nd Marine Battalion left in late August, and it was agreed between General Chehab and Admiral Holloway that two additional Marine battalions could be removed by mid- September. Ultimately the United States unilaterally announced on 8 October its intention to withdraw all forces from Lebanon by the end of that month. Thus, officially and on the record, the withdrawal of American forces was at American initiative. It was, in fact, a very considerable diplomatic success thus to have carried out a massive military operation and to have removed the troops unilaterally, although in close and cordial agreement with the Lebanese government.
VIII
While these politico-military developments were in progress, a peaceful transition took place when President Camille Chamoun served out his constitutional term of office and handed over his duties to General Chehab, the new President, on 23 September. It should not be thought, however, that everything went smooth as silk in the Embassy/CinCSpe-CoME relations with certain elements of the Lebanese population. For example, it had been widely believed by the more militant Christian faction that the sole purpose of the American landings was to wipe out the Moslem opposition by a classic bombardment of the Basta in Beirut. The Lebanese, throughout the 19th century and later, had become used to armed intervention by foreign powers, and to naval bombardment as a means of conducting foreign policy. Some Lebanese could not see why the Americans had troubled to land at Beirut if they did not use their firepower against the rebels. The Americans had wider ranges in sight, however, and more important targets at which to aim. To have landed troops to engage in partisan fighting to sustain one faction against the other would have been an unwise act; while to kill Moslems on behalf of Christians would have inflamed the 44,000,000 Arab Moslems and their co-religionists as far as the South China Sea.
IX
While the American Forces exerted a static influence in Lebanon after the change in administration between Chamoun and Chehab, the insurrection took a new turn and reached a new pitch of intensity. On 19 September, a journalist of the militant Christian Phalange Party was kidnapped and murdered, following torture, because of an article he had written reviling President Nasser of the United Arab Republic. In reprisal, the Phalange called for a general strike of Christians which was promptly carried out. Since the principal business and financial enterprises of Beirut were in Christian hands, the economic impact of this general strike was far more paralyzing to Lebanon than the more protracted, but less effective, general strike which had been imposed by the Moslem rebels since the outbreak of hostilities.
It was thus in a tense and ominous atmosphere that President Chehab was inaugurated on 23 September. His first appointment of a cabinet headed by one of the rebel leaders, Rachid Karame, who had led the insurrection in Tripoli, brought an outcry from the Christian half of the Lebanese population. The ex-President, Chamoun, who had withdrawn to a retreat in the mountains, found himself the focus of an almost ecstatic mob of partisans howling for action against the new government. In other words, the impasse, if it could be called such, had grown more serious, and the task of reconciliation more difficult.
As the crisis wore on, there were two armed camps in Beirut, the Moslem Basta and the Christian Casbah, with the Lebanese Army and the American forces on the outskirts of Beirut and in the port area maintaining an uneasy stalemate between the two.
Ultimately, thanks to leadership on both sides, with the patient and constant statesmanship of President Chehab exercising a continuous pressure, an agreement was reached on the formula proposed by the Phalangist leader, Sheikh Pierre Gemayel, of a solution of “no victor, no vanquished.” Thus, when the country had almost reached the brink of dissolution, the innate good sense of the Lebanese began to prevail and on 15 October, the civil war ended with the establishment of a four-man cabinet which epitomized the formula of “no victor, no vanquished.” This government, which was to endure for another year of fruitful and constructive activity, was composed of Rachid Karame and Haj Hussein Oueini on the Moslem side, and Pierre Gemayel and Raymond Edde representing the Christian half of Lebanon.
X
As indicated in the preface, this paper is intended as a study in diplomatic and military collaboration. Despite the initial misunderstandings and very real risks which were run on the first two days of the landings, there was an extraordinary and forthright cooperation throughout the entire duration of the American military presence between U. S. military and diplomatic personnel at all echelons.
In particular, in the top command, both diplomatic and military, the responsible officials were like a band of brothers. Copies of all Embassy telegrams, incoming and outgoing, were given to Admiral Holloway and General Adams. Of greater importance was the fact that the Admiral and the Ambassador jointly drafted many of their policy messages and almost all of the Ambassador’s reports were dictated in the presence of the military Commander-in-Chief.
At a lower level, the Embassy was able to be of continuous assistance to the military in dealing with the government of Lebanon and with the private sector of the Lebanese population. It was inevitable that, with the deployment of 15,000 troops, there would be many cases of claims, both for loss of property and for rare accidents involving military vehicles. The American military, for their part, showed ingenuity, resourcefulness, and magnificent patience in dealing with the local populace.
Perhaps rarely in the history of war have foreign troops shown more excellent deportment in a strange land. The exemplary discipline manifested by the American troops, both Army and Marine, was a source of wonderment throughout the Arab world. In the previous experience which Arabs had had with foreign armies, such forbearance on the part of invading troops was completely without precedence. In fact, the real hero of the American landings in Lebanon was the U. S. GI, whether he wore a uniform of blue, khaki or green.
As a result of this exercise in military and diplomatic co-operation, certain tangible effects in the interest of the United States were achieved. In the first place, the integrity and independence of a small, free Arab nation were maintained against external aggression. The United States, by its intervention, made clear to all the world that it stood by its friends, irrespective of their size. It is also indubitable that, without the static presence of American forces in Lebanon, the crisis would have continued, and the constructive elements in the country, which ultimately were able to carry out presidential elections and to find a solution of the crisis, could not have achieved their purpose.
Of greater politically strategic importance was the fact that the American intervention in Lebanon destroyed the myth in Arab eyes of Soviet invincibility. Following the Suez crisis in 1956, Soviet propaganda had succeeded in convincing many of the credulous in the Arab world that it was the U.S.S.R.’s threat of atomic reprisal on London and Paris which had caused the withdrawal of the French and British forces from Egypt. Now, however, when the chips were down and an American expeditionary force, at Lebanese request, had landed on the coast of the Arab world, Khrushchev was nowhere to be found.
This American action left indelible impressions in Arab minds. The Americans were mighty but they kept their might in check. They came faithfully when called by a friend but they left without harming him. The old “imperialists” had not acted like this. This was an inverse imperialism, if indeed imperialism was the word for the occasion. And so the tale ran, not only in the souks and the bazaars and the coffee houses, but in the villas of the statesmen and in the map rooms of the General Staffs. The word ran also to the New Nations, the Uncommitted Countries fiercely determined to preserve their newly-won sovereignty against all comers.
So much for the basic results of the American landing in Lebanon in 1958. As for the specific conclusions which may be drawn from this study in diplomatic and military cooperation, the three main points are:
(1) There was need for the capability of high level, flexible, over-all command decision as of zero hour, D-Day, and not D-Day plus two. Even if the Commander-in-Chief himself could not have been present, there was a requirement for greater leeway in adjusting previously written orders to changing local situations; nor should what limited power of command decision there was have been left to a lieutenant colonel on shore and a naval captain at sea whose only recourse was the rule book. Even a one-star Marine general thought his orders so peremptory as not to permit delay of execution beyond one hour— an hour plus execution which might have proved fatal to the whole purpose of the landing. The orders for the initial phase of the landing were too rigid. In fixing upon quite reasonable military objectives, they left no room for the imagination. And imagination in war is one of the ingredients which go into the making of great commanders.
(2) In the command vacuum of the first two days of the landing, the gap had to be bridged by diplomacy. The request of General Chehab for a deployment of American forces by sea to the port area; the appeal of President Chamoun “for Marines with tanks, quickly”; and the near-miss when the Lebanese tanks and artillery almost opened fire on the advancing Marine column: all these crises were dealt with successfully by the American diplomatic arm ashore.
(3) Once CinCSpeCoME had arrived and established his command, there was a smooth and sure interplay of the military and diplomatic function in the carrying out of an exercise in limited war. Political advice impinged upon military decisions, and military decisions were taken with political as well as military ends in view. As indicated previously, the entire American establishment in Lebanon, diplomatic, military, and—here a word of well earned praise—the private civilian community, worked together as a band of brothers.
In retrospect the American landing in Lebanon was a case history in the use of limited war and the practice of applied diplomacy. There can be no effective diplomacy without the existence of some form of power, whether military, economic or psychological. The use of military power in diplomacy can be either positive or negative. In the landing in Lebanon both elements of such power were present; but from the purely political point of view, the negative use of American military strength was the most effective at the time and the most lasting in long range significance. This exercise in diplomatic and military co-operation was an historic illustration of the fact that diplomacy is the expression of national strength in terms of gentlemanly discourse.
Soon we must learn to live together or we shall all die together.
General D. M. Shoup, U. S. Marine Corps