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The Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training

Foreign Affairs Oral History Project

AMBASSADOR FRANK E. MAESTRONE

Interviewed by: Hank Zivetz

Initial interview date: June 6, 1989

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Background

Entry into Foreign Service 1948

Vienna 1948-1949

Life in divided Austria

Political situation

Hamburg 1949-1954

Visa and political officer

Khorramshahr, Iran 1960-1962

Principal officer

Shatt – al – Arab Problems

View of Shah

Arms to Iran

NATO 1968-1971

Reaction to 1069 invasion of Czechoslovakia

Helsinki Declaration

Cairo 1974-1976

DCM

Kissinger shuttle diplomacy

Acting as Charge

Ambassador to Kuwait 1976-1979

U.S. objectives

Palestine

Oil

Kuwait and Arab world

Director Sinai Support Mission 1980-1982

Israeli withdrawal

Technical monitoring

Problems of on-site Egyptian deployment

Manila 1971-1974

Political counselor

Ferdinand Marcos

Political situation

Martial law

Insurrections

American policy

Cairo 1974-1976

Sadat

Retrospect

Importance of embassy

Kuwait’s military purchases and ambassador

INTERVIEW

[Note: This interview was not edited by Ambassador Maestrone.]

Q: Mr. Ambassador, just to begin, how and why did you become involved with the

Foreign Service? How did you get into the diplomatic career?

MAESTRONE: Well, that's a rather interesting and somewhat amusing story, in that I

was a military government officer in Würzburg, Germany right at the end of the war, and

I stayed on for another year. This occurred just after the end of the war. There was an

announcement that Foreign Service exams would be given again. They had been

suspended during the war, and they would be given throughout the world in various

places where the military people could take them. One of the testing spots was going to

be Oberammergau, Germany. I had been trying to get some leave from my commanding

officer, and he said, "No, we have too much to do." Along came the circular saying you

will get five days' temporary duty in Oberammergau if you want to take the Foreign

Service exam.

So I said, "This is a splendid idea. I'll get five days temporary duty in Oberammergau and

I'll take whatever this Foreign Service exam is." So I proceeded ahead in driving down in

my Adler convertible with my chauffeur to stay in the post hotel in Garmisch-

Partenkirchen, which is nearby Oberammergau and took the Foreign Service exam and I

passed.

Q: Then how long after that did you enter the Service?

MAESTRONE: It was sometime after that. I came in '48, actually. In fact, I think my

appointment was dated February 12, Lincoln's birthday, 1948.

Q: Well, you've had a long and very varied career, and we can't cover all of your

experiences. But insight into some might be of great value to future researchers. For

example, in your first posting in Vienna in 1948-49, you were present when the

occupation ended and the Austrian peace treaty was concluded. Could you reminisce a

bit about U.S.-Soviet relations in Vienna and the general political atmosphere from an

American Embassy perspective?

MAESTRONE: The relations between the United States and the Soviet Union in Vienna

were cool but correct, in that we were already entering, more or less, the period of the

Cold War, although people, perhaps, didn't really appreciate that this was occurring. We

were, for example, at the legation. This was an American legation at the time. We had not

exchanged ambassadors with Austria, because Austria had been a small country. It's only

after the war that every small country had to have its relations elevated to the level of

embassies.

We were, for example, not permitted to travel freely through the Soviet occupied zone of

Austria. We had to obtain a gray card from the Soviet authorities, which had to be applied

for and generally, at least a week ahead of time, if you wanted, say, to drive down to the

American zone in Salzburg, for example. Sometimes it was given to you fairly readily,

and other times, it was a delay that might cause you to cancel your plans. The members of

the legation were recommended not to venture into the Soviet zone unless they were

doing this, of course, on official business.

So relations were rather tense, but not overly so, at the time. One was suspicious of the

Soviet intentions even at that time, in that particular area.

Q: It has been said that first the American occupation government, then later the

American diplomats, dealt with former Nazis, Austrian Nazis, because they seemed to be

able to pull the reins of government together a little easier than those who didn't have

experiences. What was your view, at that point, in terms of the Austrians with whom you

had to work?

MAESTRONE: Well, in the first place Austria was not an occupied country in the same

sense as Germany. It was considered a liberated country, at least by the Western Allies. I

assume the Soviets subscribed to that as well, although they carried out their occupation

as they felt that they needed to, in the same way that they did in Germany.

The political situation there was pretty much dominated by socialists, so that there was

very little role for any former Austrian Nazis. I don't recall that being a problem in

Austria. Of course, we did not have the kind of control that we had in Germany and

where we, for example, could legislate law number eight, which set standards for the

employment of German Nazis, particularly in government positions, etc. You have to

remember that under the circumstances in Austria, there was an Austrian government

actually functioning. Germany was quite different. It was divided into separate zones.

There was no central authority.

Q: Now, also in Hamburg you experienced the end of military government and the

establishment of the high commission in Germany. How would you gauge American

attitudes at the time toward a future for Germany, and also for relations with the Soviet

Union?

MAESTRONE: Before I answer that, I would like to make just one comment about one

of the previous questions that you asked. Namely, I was not in Vienna when the State

Treaty was signed and the so-called occupation of the Allied powers, including the Soviet

Union, ended. I was in Salzburg on a later assignment as consul there.

Now to get to your question about Germany, the attitude of the Americans, on the whole,

was one of a certain skepticism as to Soviet policies as they seemed to be developing. Our

interest seemed, mainly, to put Germany back on its feet, not necessarily as a major

industrial, and certainly not military, power, but to enable the Germans to rebuild their

economy sufficiently to take care of themselves. We were pouring a good deal of money

and supplies in there to help maintain the German economy and, particularly, to feed the

Germans in the initial stages. So we wanted them to take over the responsibility of taking

care of themselves.

Q: Was that the essence of the work being done at the consulate in Hamburg? With whom

were you dealing on the German side out of the consulate and on what issues?

MAESTRONE: I had several assignments during my four and a half years in Hamburg.

Initially, I was a visa officer under the displaced persons program. I actually helped set up

a visa office in a refugee camp, former German barracks, outside of Hamburg.

Subsequently, I became chief of the visa section in Hamburg in the office in town.

Following that I was in the economic section, where I wrote some of the first reports after

the war about beet sugar production in Germany, about the fishing industry in Germany.

Then, my last two years, I was a political officer and occupied the position of deputy land

observer for Hamburg. That system that had been set up under military government was

that there would be land commissioners in the various provinces in Germany. Obviously,

American commissioners were in the American zone, British commissioners were in the

British zone. Hamburg happened to be in the British zone, so that they had a British land

commissioner. But the role for the other Allies, the United States and France, not the

Soviet Union, was to have land observers. In other words, we were there to observe how

the--one, the land commissioner carried out his occupation functions, and two, to keep an

eye on what the Germans were doing.

Q: In Hamburg did you have any contacts with the Soviet Union?

MAESTRONE: None whatever.

Q: None whatever. Moving along, as a sidebar to the recent Iran-Iraq war, I know that

you were consul and principal officer in Khorramshahr in 1960-62, when the oil terminal

was constructed on Kharg Island. Was there any indication at that time that this remote

area would become the focus of a bloody war?

MAESTRONE: Well, when I was in Khorramshahr, we had two crises that occurred

between Iran and Iraq. Both of them were over the question of how the boundary line that

was set along the Shatt-al-Arab River. The Shatt-al-Arab is formed, as you know, by the

confluence of the Tigris and the Euphrates and then flows past Basra in Iraq, and past

Khorramshahr and Abadan in Iran into the Persian Gulf. These crises concerned the

question of the boundary line as I have mentioned--namely, that in 1913 a boundary

commission accepted the boundary between Iran and Iraq at that point at the low water

mark of the Shatt-al-Arab on the Iranian side.

Q: Boundary commission made up of whom?

MAESTRONE: The boundary commission was made up of the Ottoman Turks, who

were then in control of the other side of the Shatt-al-Arab, what is now Iraq. The Russians

and the British, and I think the Iranian government was also represented there, but in

those days the Russians and the British pretty much ran Iraq.

Q: Iran, you mean.

MAESTRONE: I'm sorry, Iran, and the British were particularly influential in southern

Iran.

Q: Did this dispute result in violence?

MAESTRONE: What actually happened was the Iranians were shipping so much oil from

Abadan and also from other ports to the major international oil companies. I think the

seven sisters, so called, were almost all involved in the Iranian consortium. It was

operating the Iranian oil production at that time. The Iranians felt that this would be a

good time to establish their claim that the dividing line between Iran and Iraq should run

along the median line or the middle of the Shatt-al-Arab River, which is the normal way

boundary lines are set when bodies of water, or particularly rivers, divide two countries or

states.

Therefore, the particular thing that bothered them was that every ship coming up into

Abadan and Khorramshahr had to have an Iraqi pilot, since the waters were Iraqi territory.

They felt that this was very demeaning for ships to come up to the great country of Iran

with an Iraqi pilot leading them into Abadan and Khorramshahr, which were their major

ports in those days. Therefore, they decided that they would no longer accept any ship

which had an Iraqi pilot aboard. They thought that the Western countries would want

their oil so badly that they would send their ships up anyway and the Iraqis wouldn't dare

challenge the Western powers. Well, in fact, the Iraqis moved artillery down along the

banks of the Shatt-al-Arab and said that any ship coming up without an Iraqi pilot would

be shelled. So captains of oil tankers were not about to run their ships up the Shatt-al-

Arab under that sort of a threat. So nobody came up the river.

The Iranians expected the Western powers to exert pressure on Iraq to force them to make

this change. The Western powers had no intention of doing that, and eventually, after

about a month, when all their tanks became filled, and they were starting to cut back on

the refining of oil in Abadan because they had no place to put it, the Iranians finally

desisted and gave up their...

Q: Who was the ruler of Iran at this time?

MAESTRONE: The Shah.

Q: The Shah, the Pahlavi, not the father.

MAESTRONE: No.

Q: What was the American official government attitude in this controversy between Iraq

and Iran at that time?

MAESTRONE: Well, our attitude was one of being completely neutral in this. This was a

local affair in which we were not interfering.

Q: Did the British exert any influence?

MAESTRONE: No, they took the very same position. All of them took the same position.

As far as I was concerned, I talked to the people who were responsible for this down in

Abadan and pointed out to them that their case was hopeless if they expected the Western

powers to come to their assistance. But they refused to accept my advice, and finally, had

to give in. This not only happened once, but it happened twice. The next year, at the

urging of the new Abadan port director, who was, incidentally, a very cultured, well-

educated man. He had been educated in Switzerland and Belgium, spoke fluent French,

excellent English. At his urging, the Shah, I guess, authorized their undertaking the same

effort again, which resulted in the same failure, and my good friend, the port director,

ended up in jail in Tehran.

Q: Was this before the United States began to arm and support Iran as one of our

bulwarks in that part of the world?

MAESTRONE: Yes, this was, in one sense, this was before we began making major arms

shipments to Iran. Although we were supplying them with military equipment and we did

maintain military advisory groups, MAG groups, there. We had a small one in

Khorramshahr, at the Navy base there. A couple of naval officers were there helping with

training and handling some of the technical aspects of the equipment, the way they were

being supplied. We had a MAG group up in Ahvaz, which was the capital of Khuzestan,

the major province of my consular district, from which most of the oil came. They were

helping train the Iranian Army. But the training was more basic at that point.

Later on, as the Iranian Army improved its general capabilities, the decision was made in

the time of President Nixon and Henry Kissinger that the Shah would become our

bulwark in the Middle East. They supplied him with all sorts of very sophisticated arms,

and it was a different situation to that extent.

Q: One more observation on Iran before we move to another part of the world. Could you

at that time assess the attitude of the Iranian people toward the Shah, and perhaps, to

project what ultimately happened in Iran?

MAESTRONE: I was, perhaps, not in as good a position as others in Iran, those in Tehran

and other consulates, because my consular district had a population which was about 75%

Arab. The Iranians who were there were pretty much the managers, supervisors, etc., of

the operations, particularly the oil operations that took place there, or business people, all

of whom were very supportive of the Shah. But even the Arab population, the Arab-

Iranians, if you can call them that, were all very loyal to the Shah. There were some who

were unhappy when he dropped Soroya and got his new queen, Farah Diba. For quite

some time there were stories of some of the bazaaris having pictures of the Shah and

Soroya still hanging in the backs of their shops, whereas, they should have been hanging

up a picture of Farah Diba, which was passed around, of course. But many of those

shopkeepers tended to be Iranians and particularly Bakhtiaris, from which tribe Soroya

originally came.

Q: Okay, let's move ahead a little bit to NATO. In 1968 you were deputy assistant

secretary general in NATO and chairman of the NATO political committee. It was in this

period in the summer of 1968 when the Soviets and some of the Warsaw Pact Allies

invaded Czechoslovakia. Can you tell us, as an insider, some of the reactions of NATO?

MAESTRONE: Yes, they were rather interesting. The initial reaction within NATO came

from the Supreme Allied Commander General Lemnitzer, who from his headquarters in

Kasto, asked the Secretary General to give him an assessment of what all this various

movement meant in Eastern Europe. This was going on before the Warsaw Pact invasion

of Czechoslovakia. The NATO countries in our discussions in the political committee,

which I was chairing at that time, and where I had the responsibility to prepare an

assessment, which was then sent by the Secretary General to General Lemnitzer. The

attitude of the members of NATO was very cooperative. Everybody provided all the

intelligence, all the material that they had, all of their best analyses, etc., and put them

into the hopper, so to speak, at the political committee.

In discussions at the level in the council about the various steps that we might take,

particularly moving into various stages of alert for the NATO powers, there was not that

much unanimity. Some countries were particularly very cautious, and very doubtful about

taking any steps that might possibly give the wrong sign to the Soviets. The Canadians

were especially notable for their very cautious approach to this. The Danes, too, were

pretty much like that. There was a good deal of caution displayed, generally, in the

council, but, on the whole, the major powers, Britain, France, and the United States, did,

and also with support from Italy and some of the other Mediterranean countries. The

General, the Supreme Allied Commander, was given authority to take the steps he

thought were necessary in terms of raising the level of alert. Otherwise, no real military

action, particularly movement of troops, etc., took place, or was authorized, shall I say.

I'm not sure whether they took place or not, but they certainly weren't authorized by the

NATO council.

Q: You suggest, then, that even before the Soviets moved on Czechoslovakia, there was

intelligence at NATO that there was that possibility?

MAESTRONE: Oh, yes, in my final assessment, we did not rule out the--matter of fact,

we specifically said we did not rule out the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Soviets.

Q: Now, once the invasion took place, was there an escalation of the readiness position

of NATO? Was there a change in the posture of NATO?

MAESTRONE: Well, by that time, we had come to the conclusion, and we could tell

from the actions that were taken by the Warsaw Pact, that this did not represent a threat to

NATO as such. Our concern had been that there might be a spillover, and this was the

spillover which would have involved some of the NATO countries bordering

Czechoslovakia, particularly Germany. Therefore, there would have possibly been some

incident that could have exaggerated the situation. In fact, there wasn't--we could tell

from the way the Warsaw Pact troops were being moved, and the actions that were being

taken, that this did not represent a threat to NATO, as such. Therefore, there was really no

call for any further military action, other than the stage of alert that we had gone to. The

NATO powers all began protesting the Warsaw Pact action and making statements

condemning it. That was about the extent of it at that point.

Subsequently, when the NATO council met in November, a couple of months later, the

Council of Foreign Ministries had a very interesting and detailed discussion of this

situation. It came up with a communiqué, which was very strong in its opposition to this

so-called Brezhnev Doctrine. Particularly, it made the point in a very clear matter,

without actually using the name of Yugoslavia, that any action that might be taken against

Yugoslavia, which you remember had veered away from the Soviet bloc, would have very

severe consequences, or grave consequences, as it was put. This was a very clear signal

that the Soviets--the NATO powers would not condone that kind of an action.

Q: Yet, in your tenure in Brussels, there was an obvious shift in attitude toward the Soviet

Union, in preparation for the Helsinki meeting, and I understand that you were involved

in the political advisor study that led to the Helsinki Declaration. What was NATO's

input to Helsinki, and what were the attitudes of the NATO Americans, those Americans

in NATO and others, about an accommodation with the Soviets?

MAESTRONE: The NATO input into what came out of the Helsinki conference, namely

the Helsinki Declaration, was a major contribution. To answer your question, the input

from NATO which resulted in the Helsinki Declaration was a major one. In fact, at a

certain point, there were indications from a number of NATO countries, particularly the

smaller countries, Denmark, Belgium, Canada, and others, that NATO should be more

responsive to these calls which the Soviet Union was making for a European security

conference. These calls had been going on for quite a number of years back into the '50s,

but they seemed to elicit, at least, a greater interest among certain NATO members, who

wanted to have NATO consider going to a European security conference.

I was particularly concerned by this development and spoke to the Secretary General

Manlio Brosio and suggested that this might be a good time to conduct a study which

would look at the advantages and disadvantages to NATO of participating in a European

security conference. He agreed, and he put this proposition to the council, and it was

approved by the NATO council. The political committee then undertook an extensive

study, which lasted for a couple of years, at least, in which--I should say lasted longer

than a couple of years--but in which I participated for a couple of years before I was

transferred. So that a lot of the basic work for the Helsinki conference was done in the

NATO political committee.

Q: Now this study--that's very interesting--this study involved itself in issues in areas

beyond the military context. Did it go into human rights and other things that came out of

the Helsinki?

MAESTRONE: Yes, it initially started with a discussion of confidence-building

measures, which is a subject of a continuing conference that came up with the Stockholm

Declaration, or--I forget what it was called--a few years back which is continuing now in

Vienna, and also discussed the various political impacts that this kind of a conference

could result in. As I recall, it was the Italians who brought into the discussion the question

of human rights and the freedom of information, etc., and that was added to our

discussions.

So the three baskets which came out of the Geneva preparatory meetings for the Helsinki

Conference originated in the NATO discussions and were included in the political

committee's report.

Q: Was the American position at that time favorable to proceeding with this conference?

MAESTRONE: Interesting enough, in the initial discussions, the United States, Britain,

West Germany were all opposed to going to any European Security Conference, and took

a fairly hard line in this connection. Although they participated very actively in the

studies and made--particularly the United States and Britain made excellent contributions

to the study.

An interesting development that took place, subsequently, was that, in the days of

President Nixon and Henry Kissinger, the Secretary of State, there came the desire to

make some foreign policy progress in our relationships with the Soviet Union,

particularly, I think, in connection with the reelection of President Nixon for domestic

political purposes. In any event, this was one of the driving forces and, suddenly, the U.S.

position changed from being opposed to attending the European Security Conference to

being very much in favor of it and pushing for the conclusion of the study and for a

movement toward a kind of understanding or rapprochement with the Soviet Union which

resulted in the Helsinki Declaration.

Q: The irony is that Nixon wasn't around to take the bows or the brickbats. Because if I

remember correctly, the reaction in the United States for its participation or acceptance

of this was not all positive.

MAESTRONE: I gather it wasn't. By that time, I was in Manila, in the Philippines, and

did not receive as much information about the reactions in the United States and in the

other countries about this declaration.

Q: Okay, now maybe we can move closer to your tour as ambassador to Kuwait, but,

first, a word about Henry Kissinger and his peace shuttle, and the negotiations for the

second Sinai disengagement during your tour as DCM in Cairo. How might you

characterize the sentiments of your embassy colleagues toward the events of the war and

the efforts to work out an accommodation?

MAESTRONE: I arrived in Cairo a number of months after the war. It was just about a

year after the October '73 War I was there, late September 1974. The embassy was then a

very small embassy. It was very active in resuming relationships with the Egyptian

government, which had been suspended since 1967, and only resumed early--I think, it

was in February or March of 1974 that the embassy was reestablished in Cairo. We had

had an interests section operating there before. The members of the embassy were all very

interested in this new political development.

Q: Could you tell us a little bit about your involvement with the Kissinger mission?

MAESTRONE: Well, we had at least ten visits by Henry Kissinger while I was there in

Cairo because of the shuttle activities. These came fairly frequently and completely

occupied the attention of the embassy, I mean, for all practical purposes--yes, it was still a

small embassy in those days, not the great monster that it is today. We had to devote all

our attention to supporting the Kissinger circus that came in. As with all visits by

Secretaries of State--and I have participated in these in my earlier days when I was in the

executive secretariat under John Foster Dulles. All of the secretaries of states' visits are

circuses. I mean, they come in and there's a great upset of everything the embassy is doing

and all attention is focused on them. But they were all aimed at achieving a peaceful

development of the relationships between Egypt and Israel, and they were well worth the

effort that's put into them.

Q: You know, it's been said, because of modern communications and transportation, that

many major issues are taken out of the hands of the people at an embassy, and the ball is

run by someone, like a Kissinger, out of Washington. Was there much input from you and

your colleagues in Cairo during these initiatives?

MAESTRONE: There was considerable input, particularly from our ambassador,

Hermann Eilts, who was very closely consulted by Henry Kissinger on many of the steps

he took with respect to Egypt. In fact, Ambassador Eilts was called away on consultation

by Henry Kissinger, not only to Washington, but often to other places where Kissinger

happened to be, particularly if it was not too far from the area. I think once he went to

Pakistan or something like that to consult on these matters, so that there was very close

consultation between the head of the embassy and the Secretary of State on these issues.

As a result of Hermann Eilts being absent a good deal of the time, I was chargé d'affaires

during some interesting developments there as well.

Q: Could you elaborate on some of these?

MAESTRONE: None of them were what you would call major developments. I

remember there was one issue in which the Egyptians were going to bring up a matter in

the United Nations about this whole relationship between Egypt and Israel, which would

have upset the Israelis and disturbed the course of these negotiations. I remember this

occurred in the summertime. Hermann Eilts was away on consultation. The Foreign

Minister Fahmy was up on the beach in Alexandria. He had a little beach kind of hut or

cottage there, to which he used to repair during the summer. I remember I had to drive up

there and negotiate with him while he was sitting in his bathing trunks on the beach there

to convince him to drop this U.N. effort that they were planning to undertake.

Q: Successfully, I assume?

MAESTRONE: Yes.

Q: How was the swimming?

MAESTRONE: He did the swimming. I never had the chance to. I had to rush back and

send a cable. [Laughter]

Q: As ambassador to Kuwait in 1976 through '79, what were the principal American

foreign policy objectives in that country and in that part of the world as you saw it from

Kuwait?

MAESTRONE: Our principal objectives, really, related to two aspects of our

relationships with the Middle East and with Kuwait, the first being the whole peace

process. We were seeking to obtain Kuwaiti support for the peace process, for Camp

David, for all sorts of steps that were being taken to try to bring peace to the Middle East,

and particularly, the Palestinian question. The Kuwaitis were, of course, very interested in

the Palestinian question. In fact, one quarter of the population of Kuwait were

Palestinians. They occupied the middle level of the bureaucracy in Kuwait. In fact, they

were the ones who made it run. But the policy decisions were taken by the Kuwaitis, not

by the Palestinians. That was quite clear.

The other aspect related to oil and finance. We were concerned about the various steps

OPEC was taking, particularly, with respect to raising the price of oil. I know the

Secretary of the Treasury, Mike Blumenthal, made a couple of trips over there in this

connection, both of them unsuccessful.

The other matter that was of considerable concern was the question of the dollar, which,

at that time, had lost a great deal in value. There was concern, on our part, that the oil-rich

countries in the Middle East might shift their dollar assets to marks or yen. The yen was

not particularly popular then--or Swiss francs or something like that, further pushing

down the value of the dollar, while we were trying to hold it at a reasonable level. The

Kuwaitis were particularly cooperative in that respect, and held on to their dollars. As a

result, when the dollar, after this crisis had passed, really went up, they profited from all

of this. So it was a wise move on their part, and they were very supportive of us. They

looked at it in terms of supporting the whole world economy, since the dollar is such an

important element in it. I thought they took a very responsible attitude on the issue.

Q: You know, there are many players in the Middle East. How would you rank Kuwait in

terms of influencing the policies of the Arab world? And how would you rank the United

States in terms of outside influence on the Middle East, particularly in Kuwait?

MAESTRONE: The last part of that is a rather large question. In terms of the Kuwaiti

influence, the Kuwaitis were influential in OPEC questions. They had pretty much of an

intelligent oil policy, and they had some capable people running it. So they did have a

good deal of influence there. Politically speaking, the Kuwaitis had relatively little

influence. It is a very small country. They were anxious to keep the best relations with all

of their larger neighbors, such neighbors being Iran, Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, etc. All of

them were bigger than they. Therefore, they were not very prominent in making policy in

that respect. They did take certain stands from time to time. But they tended not to be

major policy makers in that respect.

When it came to oil and financial matters, there they were much more active and they did

play a role. Their people were, generally, much more experienced, much more capable

than the Saudis, for example, in this field.

Q: Now, in terms of the second part of the question, how much impact did the Americans

have in terms of oil policies? In terms of Arab-Israeli conflict issues, in terms of the

terrorist problem, how influential was the U.S.?

MAESTRONE: The United States' role in the peace process was very influential, starting

all the way back with the Kissinger shuttle. It continued to play a role, although its

influence after Camp David became less and less, since most of the Arabs objected to the

Israeli-Egyptian peace treaty. Since we had been the engineers of this treaty, we were not

that popular in the political terms.

However, in other aspects, we had a good deal of influence. For example, we had an

extensive military sales program with the Kuwaitis, in which we supplied them with

military equipment. It had been determined by a U.S. military survey conducted years

earlier that it would be necessary for them to maintain a creditable defense; that is, at

least, a short-term defense of their country if attacked.

Q: From whom did they expect the attack?

MAESTRONE: The attack could have been expected from Iraq, with which they did not

have particularly good relations, and which had--and I think still maintains way on the

back burner--a claim over Kuwait. Although it was not part of the Ottoman Empire, the

Sheikh of Kuwait paid a tribute to the Turkish governor, General Basra, or the Wallie, I

guess he was called--Wallie Basra. And the Iraqis presumed from that that the Basra

authorities had some influence and authority over Kuwait and have maintained this claim,

which I have not heard has been dropped.

Q: What was the year that you were director of the Sinai support mission?

MAESTRONE: I was director of the Sinai support mission from 1980 to 1982.

Q: Yes, could you tell us something about that?

MAESTRONE: The United States-Sinai support mission was the result of the

negotiations which took place with respect to the second Sinai disengagement agreement

between Egypt and Israel, which were conducted both in Israel and Alexandria, Egypt,

when I was DCM in Cairo. In fact, I was control officer for the Egyptian end of the

negotiation.

The agreement had essentially been reached, but the Israelis wanted some kind of an

assurance that their withdrawal--because this would require them to disengage from their

previous alliance, vis à vis the Egyptians--that this would be that the buffer zone between

the two would be monitored, and they insisted that the Americans do this. So it was

agreed that the Americans would set up a technical monitoring system which used sensors

and a variety of things that were subsequently developed to do this. They would be

located in the Sinai desert between the Israelis and the Egyptians.

This was, I think, in addition to the agreement of protocol, or something like that. I'm a

little dim in my memory on if this was actually part of the agreement or an annex to it. In

any event, it was agreed that we would undertake this. And when we agreed to do that,

then the Israelis were willing to agree to the disengagement arrangements. But the Israelis

insisted that there could be no nationals employed, and they were thinking, of course, of

the Egyptians working for the Americans who were there, because they were afraid that

they might be intelligence people or something like that. So the Sinai field mission, so

called, was set up, made up completely of Americans. There was not a single Egyptian, or

Israeli, or any other nationality involved in this operation.

When I took it over in 1980, they had moved from their previous phase of the technical

monitoring to an actual on-site inspection of Egyptian deployments in the Sinai. There

had been a subsequent further disengagement, which came as a result of the Egyptian-

Israeli peace treaty. The military requirements, with respect to the Sinai, set in the peace

treaty had to be monitored, and this was done by the existing Sinai field mission, which

sent people actually around to count tanks and personnel, etc. This included some Israeli

installations as well that still were in the Sinai.

Q: Where were you physically?

MAESTRONE: Physically, I was located in the Department of State, where I had a suite

of offices. It was a relatively small operation. I had about 16 technical experts, etc.,

working in the Sinai support mission as such. We had the major work and the whole

operation was done by a company with whom we had a contract, namely, E Systems of

Dallas, Texas.

Q: It was a civilian operation?

MAESTRONE: Yes.

Q: Oh, that's interesting.

MAESTRONE: It was entirely civilian. That was another requirement that was insisted

upon by the Egyptians, that this be entirely civilian, and no military people were to be

involved in this, completely a civilian operation. Although it was not specifically stated,

we were very careful never to select retired personnel who had been with CIA or any of

the other intelligence agencies. We did hire retired military personnel because we needed

their expertise in terms of identifying tanks, airplanes, etc. But these people were no

longer associated directly with the military services.

Q: Is this still going on? I know that there is something there, but is this the same

operation?

MAESTRONE: The American-Sinai operation was concluded in April 1982 under the

Egyptian- Israeli peace treaty. This was one of the steps that was taken--

Q: What's happening now?

MAESTRONE: When the Israelis withdrew completely from the Sinai, at that point the

American operation closed down. It was turned over to the multinational force and

observers, I think it's called, MFO, which again was something that was insisted upon by

the Israelis, and in which there was to be American military participation, as well as

participation from a number of other countries, I think, nine or ten other countries.

Q: Under the aegis of the U.N.?

MAESTRONE: No, this did not come under the aegis of the U.N., because the Israelis

would not agree that the U.N. would be involved. They were, and continue to be, very

suspicious of the U.N. So it was a separate operation, an international operation set up, in

effect, by the United States, Israel, and Egypt.

Q: While you were director of the Sinai support mission, were there any specific

problems or crises?

MAESTRONE: There were a number that came up about various Egyptian deployments,

etc., at least, that the Israelis reported their intelligence had picked up. But our practice

was to, naturally, inspect these challenges from either side immediately, then to hold a

meeting between the Egyptians and the Israelis themselves, at which we were merely

observers. We would present the facts of our inspection, and then allow them to discuss

and settle the problem. This helped to build a good working relationship between the

Egyptian and Israeli military, which served to be part of the development of their

relationship under the peace treaty.

Q: Let's move back a little bit to 1971 when you were consular of embassy for political

affairs in Manila. Was Ferdinand Marcos in charge at that time in Manila?

MAESTRONE: Oh, absolutely, he was president and, in actual fact, at that time his

presidency, particularly his first term--he had been elected for a second term--was

considered to have been a rather good era in Philippine relations and development, since

Marcos had had a pretty good administration. Obviously there was corruption, but

corruption is pretty much endemic throughout that area, not to mention other areas as

well, including, maybe, the United States. But his terms in office were considered to be

rather exemplary.

However, the political situation in the Philippines had begun to deteriorate considerably

because of the antics of the various political powers throughout the Philippines. Each one

in his particular area had his stronghold. Although they were supporters of Marcos, he

was not really able to control them as much as he would have liked. They did support his

policies when they were in the Senate or in the House of Representatives. But when they

were operating in their own areas, they carried on somewhat independently. Their actions,

particularly during various elections, were especially reprehensible. When candidates

looked like they might have a chance of upsetting some of their favorite people, they were

eliminated by ambushes, shooting, what have you, and this solved the political problem

for them.

Also there was a great deal of shooting going on in the cities; everybody carried guns. So

it was really getting quite dangerous if you were caught in a cross-fire. There were a

number of incidents that happened in Manila while I was there. In view of this

deteriorating situation it was expected that Marcos would declare martial law to

reestablish control in the Philippines. In fact, I had lunch--I think it was on a Wednesday--

with Benigno Aquino, in which we discussed this situation, during which he said that if

the president declares martial law, he would support him. However, he was one of his

major opposition leaders. What actually happened was that martial law was declared at

midnight on Friday. The first man that was arrested under martial law was Benigno

Aquino, so he never got a chance to support Ferdinand Marcos in this respect.

Q: Are you suggesting that the martial law was used to squelch the opposition, rather

than to clean up the abuses?

MAESTRONE: No, I am not suggesting that, although it was also used for that reason.

But the primary reason for martial law was to try to bring order back into the country. The

military took control of various areas. In fact, an order was issued that all Filipinos had to

turn in their weapons, not just assault weapons, but all kinds of weapons. Indeed, they

turned in hundreds of thousands of weapons, because they were required to do so. At

least, it was estimated that, maybe, half the weapons were turned in. There was still half

outstanding, but these went from pistols all the way up to, I think, a governor in some

remote province had a small tank that he had someone build for his forces down in that

area. The situation improved, absolutely immediately. I mean, no longer did you see

people carrying guns around or anything like that. The shooting stopped. Indeed, Marcos'

action was certainly approved by the majority of the people. There was no doubt about it.

Even some of the politicians I knew who were in opposition to Marcos approved of his

action.

What happened later, of course, was a different story. Initially, it started all right. The

Filipinos did not expect it to continue. They thought it was a temporary measure.

Q: Now are you saying that martial law was continued even after some kind of stability

was restored?

MAESTRONE: Oh, yes, it was years, yes.

Q: Yes, and perverted in that period, too.

MAESTRONE: Oh, yes.

Q: Did you have a chance to meet Marcos and Imelda in that period?

MAESTRONE: Oh, yes.

Q: What was your impression of these people?

MAESTRONE: Marcos was one of the most articulate men I've ever met, particularly, in

English. I recall, as a matter of fact, when martial law was instituted--as I say, it was at

midnight Friday--Saturday afternoon he gave a speech which was televised, in which he

spoke for three hours detailing all the reasons why this had taken place and what he

planned to do, etc., without notes, and never repeated himself once in completely fluent

English, with a few peculiar pronunciations, which are peculiar to the Filipinos, anyway.

He was a rather impressive fellow, quite intelligent, sharp. Imelda I never, really got to

know very well. I met her on numerous occasions, but she was a very cold person, in

personality terms, and one of the things that put me off immediately was that sort of limp

handshake, something like grabbing onto a cold fish. I just never cared for her very much.

Q: What was the official American position toward Marcos in that period?

MAESTRONE: We had a very close relationship with Marcos, although we did not

approve of martial law, in fact. Although I personally considered that had it been

continued only for a short period until order was gotten back to the Philippines, it was

probably a good thing. But we never approved of the continuation of martial law. We had

an Ambassador Hank Byroade, who had an especially good relationship with Marcos,

which he developed over the years prior to martial law. Marcos would consult with

Byroade on a variety of matters, although he did not consult him on the martial law, for

instance.

Q: There was an insurrection in the Philippines at that time. Was this strictly a religious

or Muslim insurrection, or was there a communist element involved there?

MAESTRONE: There were two insurrections going on. One was the continuation of the

original Huk insurrection, which became the New People's Army and was led by the--

continued to be led by the communists, which continues today--which, indeed, under the

extended period of Marcos' rule gained strength throughout the country.

The other occurred at the time I was there and was a Muslim insurrection, which was

designed to obtain more autonomy for the governing of certain of the southern areas,

particularly, in the Sulu Islands and the province of Cotabato. Where the Muslims were,

in the case of the Sulus a majority, and in Cotabato, I think, they probably had at least

fifty percent of the population. This started up. It was a very difficult matter for the

Philippine army to deal with because a lot of it took place in these tropical forests and

what have you, where there was plenty of opportunity for concealment. Also, the Sulu

Islands stretched out toward the island of Borneo, where there was the state of Sabah,

where many of the Sulu islanders had relatives and they received support and military

supplies and so on from them. So it was a difficult thing for the Philippine armed forces

to deal with.

Q: Well, when you were there, did the United States supply arms to the Philippine

military in order to put down these rebellions?

MAESTRONE: No, we didn't supply arms for them to put down the rebellions. Well,

perhaps we did with respect to the communists, the New People's Army rebellion, but not

with respect to the Muslim rebellion. But then how could you distinguish between them?

We had a regular military assistance program going. We had a large one in connection

with all of our arrangements with respect to the major bases we have there, Clark Air

Force Base and Subic Naval Base.

Q: Was there agitation, at that time, for Americans to get out of the bases in the

Philippines?

MAESTRONE: Only from a very small radical fringe. Otherwise, the Americans had a

great deal of support. In fact, during my time there, there was a movement by one

politician to have the Philippines become the 51st American state. It was surprising the

amount of support, indeed, embarrassing to Marcos, the amount of support he was able to

generate. He, of course, tried to tamp this down as much as we could.

Q: Well, over your career, you've met and worked with many prominent, and some not so

prominent, American diplomats and foreign leaders. Do any of these leaders stand out in

your mind as being special personalities, as having made a particular mark on history in

their area or in the world?

MAESTRONE: Well, certainly, in terms of the foreigners that I met, yes, many of them

made an impressive contribution to one thing or another in terms of politics or

economics. Starting back in Austria, I'm trying quickly to remember the name of the

foreign minister who was very active and very capable under the government of the

Chancellor Figl. The foreign minister's name is well known, but it escapes me for the

moment.

Then in Germany I met a number of people, some I didn't meet but I saw speak and

attended various ceremonies where they were present, took an active part like Adenauer

and others. In Germany, also, John McCloy was high commissioner when I was there. I

remember attending some of his staff meetings in Bonn in my capacity as deputy land

observer for Hamburg, very impressive personality.

Then, certainly, in NATO there were all kinds of top people there, Couve de Murville

Paul Henri Spaak, just to name a few, Edward Heese, Selwyn Lloyd and numbers of

others, Walter Shale, who was subsequently President of the Federal Republic, Willy

Brandt, Helmut Schmidt, and one of the people whose role was very understated but who

made a tremendous contribution, I thought, to NATO during the time I was there, Manlio

Brosio, the Secretary General of NATO, who had also been ambassador to the United

States from Italy when I was the Italian desk officer some years before.

Certainly, in the Middle East, Anwar Sadat was one of the outstanding statesmen that the

world has seen. I had the occasion to meet him numerous times and to take important

Americans, senators, congressmen, etc., to meet with him when I was chargé d'affaires.

Q: Could we focus on Sadat, because the conventional wisdom has it that he could be

elected to any position in the world except in--he couldn't be elected to anything in Cairo;

that his popularity was more international than it was domestic. Did you find that to be

true?

MAESTRONE: I think that can only be characterized as accurate in terms of a

charismatic attraction. He did not have the charismatic attraction from the Egyptian

people that Nasser did, for example. On the other hand, his efforts to achieve peace were

fully supported by the Egyptian people. And I don't mean the politicians, etc. The people

on the street, I remember, meeting with them at the various bazaars elsewhere, and, you

know, they were all in favor of peace. They even thought Henry Kissinger was a great

man because he was working for peace in that direction. So that I think that that's a bit

overdrawn. He was not a charismatically popular political figure, but he was highly

respected by the Egyptian people. Certainly, his dedication to peace, which I had

personally observed in a number of occasions, was as great as you would find in any great

statesman. And very impressive, indeed, I--there were occasions in the negotiations for

the second Sinai disengagement where he overruled his entire cabinet to make

concessions which were minor concessions in his view, because they would enable larger

steps to be made in the direction of peace. His various advisors would insist on, you

know, limiting the number of kilometers of an area that they would agree the Israelis

could still hold and that kind of thing. Sadat dismissed all of this as minor details which

were not important in achieving the objective he sought, and he was right.

Q: Yet, on his assassination, it appeared that the Egyptian populace was not as--well,

they may have been shocked--but not as distraught as we might have thought, considering

the position he held under our eyes.

MAESTRONE: Well, no, he did not attract the kind of fanaticism, for example, that you

see in Tehran today when Khomeini died. He didn't attract that kind of thing, but he did

have high respect. And, besides, the whole question of his funeral, etc. was handled so

very rapidly and very quickly without the populace being given an opportunity to

participate. It's true there was no, sort of, natural outburst on the part of the people with

respect to Sadat. And, of course, his assassination was accomplished by radical Muslim

fundamentalists who were in the Army and who had managed to work their way into this

particular parade.

Q: Sadat would be one of the major personalities with whom you have worked and had

some relationship in your career?

MAESTRONE: Certainly, I'd say he would be, certainly, one of the major personalities.

And the others would be Marcos, although had less direct contact in that sense, since it

was pretty much reserved to the ambassador. But, whereas, in Cairo I was chargé

d'affaires for long periods of time and frequent periods of time so that I did have more

contact with Sadat. Others I met, interestingly enough, there were quite a number of

people in Kuwait who would come there on visits, including President Tito, with whom I

had a long conversation at one diplomatic dinner there. I met a lot of these people,

General Zia ul-Haq of Pakistan; another one, the Prime Minister of Afghanistan, not too

long before he was assassinated. A whole variety of people I met during my career.

Q: Would you say--and we might end on this one, and it may be a rather difficult question

to address. I'm finding it difficult to frame. When we confront problems at an embassy,

these problems are major in terms of our perspective from which we address them. That

is, from the embassy point of view, if it's a problem, usually it's an important problem.

But now that you're retired and looking back over a career, how much impact would you

say our efforts in various embassies and missions--how much impact on the course of

events did the U.S. have through its embassy operations? Am I making it too

complicated?

MAESTRONE: I understand what you are trying to get at, and it is a very difficult

question to answer because it is difficult to assess how much of the credit should be given

to the work of the embassy in putting forward a U.S. policy. It's really quite difficult. I

think the embassies play a considerable role. I wouldn't care to determine it on a scale of

one to ten. It varies from question to question. There are some cases when the ambassador

can, even without consulting the Department of State, accomplish certain things which

are in the interest of the country.

For example, I had one case when I was talking to the--or actually discussing our military

sales program with the Defense Minister of Kuwait, who is presently the Crown Prince

and Prime Minister, Sheikh Saad al-Abdullah al-Salim Al Sabah. Sheikh Abdullah was

telling me that they were planning to acquire the Soviet anti-aircraft system. I think it's

the ZSU 23, it's called. It was the best anti-aircraft system available, and the Kuwaitis had

been trying to get some sort of a suitable anti-aircraft system from us or from one of the

Western countries. None of the ones that were available in the West were rated as high as

the Soviet one. In fact, the United States had a very poor system. I forget what it was

called. We still don't have a very good anti-aircraft system available to our military

forces. But we had supplied the Kuwaitis with the Hawk missile, which was an

intermediate and high-level aircraft defense system. I told Sheikh Abdullah that there was

no way he could acquire this Soviet system, because in order to have a completely

adequate air defense, the Soviet system would have to be integrated with the Hawk

system to give them complete coverage, since the Soviet system was a low-level anti-

aircraft system. I reminded him that we had a classified agreement with respect to the

classified aspects of the Hawk system. I said that in order to install the Soviet system, the

Soviets would have to be informed of how our Hawk system works in every detail in

order to integrate their system. I said, "We just can't do that." And that was the end of it,

right there. I reported this to the Department, incidentally, never got comment from them

one way or another. But he dropped the whole matter.

Obviously, my experience in military affairs, having been with NATO, etc., all of that

enabled me to deal with that kind of a matter directly, which is why I think it is so

important to have ambassadors who have professional experience in the Foreign Service.

While there may be exceptions, on the whole, I think that the political appointees to

ambassadorships just cannot measure up to the kind of quality that a Foreign Service

officer who is appointed to ambassador can give to this country.

Q: Well, unless you have any more editorial opinions, I think we can call it quits at this

point. [Laughter]

MAESTRONE: I have several more, but I will refrain.

Q: Thank you very much, Mr. Ambassador.

End of interview