Lessons for today from the AWACS controversy

Reagan was a very pro-Israel president, but he was still willing to sell weapons to Saudi Arabia, even when Israel saw it as a serious threat. Trump could do the same.

AUGUST 18, 2020 20:51

An F-35 on the runway during the Blue Flag drill (photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST) — An F-35 on the runway during the Blue Flag drill

(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM/THE JERUSALEM POST)

It seems that the normalization agreement between the UAE and Israel did not involve the sale of F-35 jets to the Emirates.

Before those denials, the scuttlebutt revolved around how such a sale could impact Israel’s qualitative military edge (QME). And the option of the US selling the planes anyway, without it being a part of the deal Israel and the UAE sign, still remains.

American law defines the QME as “the ability to counter and defeat any credible conventional military threat from any individual state or possible coalition of states or from non-state actors, while sustaining minimal damages and casualties, through the use of superior military means, possessed in sufficient quantity, including weapons, command, control, communication, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities that in their technical characteristics are superior in capability to those of such other individual or possible coalition of states or non-state actors.”

The QME has been a concept in Israel’s defense since 1953, when then-prime minister David Ben-Gurion said it is essential for Israel to maintain that edge over its adversaries. The US was long Israel’s partner in maintaining that edge. It was written into US law in September 2008, in the Naval Vessel Transfer Act which states that maintaining Israel’s QME must be considered before any proposed sale of defense articles relevant to that law to Middle Eastern countries.

Former US president Ronald Reagan pledged in 1981 that the US would maintain Israel’s “qualitative and quantitative” military superiority, and every president has reaffirmed it since.

But that promise from Reagan came after he took steps that Israel strongly felt threatened that advantage.

The story began in 1978, when then-US president Jimmy Carter’s administration proposed to sell fighter jets to Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Israel at the same time. The national security advisor at the time, Zbigniew Brzezinski said the package would “break the grip of the Israel lobby.”

But Israel’s supporters did raise objections to the move, and the Carter administration restricted the F-15s’ range, firepower, avionics and refueling capabilities, and basing, which could not be near Israel, and committed to not sell any enhancements for the jets.

But in 1980, the Saudis told Brzezinski on a visit to Riyadh that they wanted to enhance the F-15s with air-to-air missiles, fuel tanks and more, and that they wanted Airborne Warning and Control System planes, known as AWACS.

The following year, 37 days after Reagan became president, his administration decided to lift the restrictions, and planned to sell five AWACS.

Meanwhile a bipartisan group of 53 Senators urged Reagan not to formally ask Congress to approve the arms sale, with Israel being one of the considerations, and the idea that the US was giving in to Saudi threats of price-gouging being another. Ted Kennedy called it “one of the worst and most dangerous arms sales ever.” AIPAC also heavily lobbied Congress against the deal.

Then-prime minister Menachem Begin responded with “profound regret and unreserved opposition,” expressing a sense of betrayal by the US and concern that the AWACS could track the IAF and deny Israel the ability to launch surprise attacks. Begin called the proposed arms deal “a grave threat” to Israel’s security.

The Reagan administration was able to sell the weapons in the end, getting the votes they needed in the Senate after limiting the Saudis’ use of the planes. But the president also pledged to maintain Israel’s QME.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump may be the closest pair of Israeli and American leaders ever. Their administrations are very in sync.

But Reagan was a very pro-Israel president, who developed a good personal relationship with Begin, but he was still willing to sell weapons to Saudi Arabia, even when Israel saw it as a serious threat.

Netanyahu has expressed his deep opposition to the US selling F-35 planes to the UAE on multiple occasions.

Still, Trump could decide to proceed with such a sale, like Reagan.