Word: jordan
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Beyond encouraging direct Arab-Israeli negotiations and resisting Russia's attempts to brand Israel the aggressor and strip away all of its gains, U.S. policymakers are looking toward the future-far into the future. Lyndon Johnson characteristically visualizes a TVA-style project for the Jordan River basin. White House Aide Walt Rostow, in a commencement address at Vermont's Middlebury College, proposed a regional economic program. But no long-range plan can work, as Johnson conceded at a weekend fund-raising dinner in Austin, unless each nation in the area accepts "the right of its neighbors to stable...
...economic sinkhole. To try to integrate the 1,330,000 Arabs in all the occupied lands would be costly and perhaps dangerous.* What then did Israel want? For simple security, it wanted at least a buffer strip on the rocky heights of Syria and a slice of West Jordan to fatten out its own narrow waistline. It also wanted free passage through Aqaba, perhaps guaranteed by an Israeli garrison at Sharm el Shiekh...
Next day, as Israeli troops captured the west bank of the Suez Canal, Jordan broke ranks and accepted the U.N. cease-fire that Moscow had been desperately trying to arrange for three days to save the Arabs from total disaster. The Egyptians fought one final tank battle at Suez in a frantic attempt to open a retreat path for what was left of their 80,000-man ground force in Sinai; then they, too, agreed to the ceasefire. Syria joined the chorus only a few hours later...
...shot at Israeli ground forces during the entire war; as they manned their border positions, its soldiers played a backgammon-like game called tricktrack and watched the Syrians and Israelis trade shellfire. Breastbeating to the contrary, Syrian ground forces made no significant move to relieve the pressure on Jordan and Egypt. Few Arab pilots had a chance to show their skills; and those that did came out second best. The Israelis shot down 50 Arab fighters while losing only three. Arab field communications were so bad that Egypt was soon reduced to sending messages to its men in Sinai...
Whether King Hussein in Jordan and the Baathist regime in Syria can do as well in the wake of disaster remains to be seen. Hussein, unshaven and haggard in battle dress after three days without sleep, made his own public reckoning. But it was the plain speaking of a candid and courageous man. Israel had won "with overwhelming strength," he said, adding, his eyes glistening, "I hope people all over the world will recognize the efforts this country made to defend its soil...