The issue of the Dimona reactor was among President Kennedy’s top issues immediately after he took office on 20 January 1961. On 30 January Secretary of State Dean Rusk submitted to Kennedy a two-page report about Israel’s atomic energy activities. The next day Kennedy met departing American Ambassador to Israel, Ogden Reid, primarily to be briefed about the matter of Dimona. Reid told Kennedy that an inspection of the Dimona reactor could be arranged, "if it is done on a secret basis." The First American Visit to Dimona
Kennedy was determined to make good on Ben Gurion’s pledge to the Eisenhower administration for a visit of American scientists to Dimona. Ben Gurion, however, appeared equally determined not to arrange the visit anytime soon. To complicate the problem, Ben Gurion’s domestic political crisis--the Lavon Affair—intensified. During February-April 1961 a pattern emerged in which the United States would press for a date for the visit, while Israel would invoke Ben Gurion’s domestic problems or the Jewish holidays as reasons for delaying the visit.
By late March 1961 Ben Gurion realized that he could no longer postpone the visit. Myer Feldman and Abe Feinberg persuaded him that a meeting between him and Kennedy, in return for an American visit to Dimona, was necessary to avoid confrontation and save the Dimona project. Ben Gurion asked to set such visit to late May and approved the visit to Dimona against the objections of Foreign Minister Meir (who was, apparently, concerned about the implications of misleading the American scientists).
On 10 April Ambassador Harman informed the State Department that the visit to Dimona was scheduled for the week of 15 May. The preparations for the visit moved now to the working level. The USAEC selected two of its scientists to conduct the visit: Ulysses Staebler, assistant director of the AEC Reactor Development Divison, and Jesse Croach, a heavy water expert employed by Dupont at the AEC Savannah River facility.
Staebler and Croach arrived in Israel on 17 May, and two days later, on Saturday 20 May, visited Dimona escorted by Professor Ephraim Katzir-Katachalsky and Dimona director Manes Pratt. They were briefed by their Israeli hosts about the deliberation process that led, in 1957, to the decision to expand Israel’s nuclear program through the Dimona project. The Dimona complex was presented to them as a transitory stage in Israel’s ambitious plans to become part of the atomic revolution.
On 26 May National Security Advisor, McGeorge Bundy received a two-page memorandum report from the State Department on the scientists’ visit, including "tentative conclusions and opinions," which might be of relevance to President Kennedy for his meeting with Ben Gurion on 30 May. In essence, the scientists concluded that the reactor "is of the scope and peaceful character previously described to the United States."
The positive report was critical for making the meeting between President Kennedy and Prime Minister Ben Gurion on 30 May successful. The confrontation over Dimona was delayed for another two years.
Documents
Document 1. On 30 January 1961, ten days after President Kennedy assumed office, Secretary Rusk submitted a two-page memo to President Kennedy on the subject of Israel’s Atomic Energy Activities. The memo, and its attached chronology, summarizes the diplomatic exchanges that had taken place between the Eisenhower administration and the Israeli government, saying that "categoric assurances" were obtained from Ben Gurion "that Israel does not have plans for developing atomic weaponry. As to Ben Gurion’s assurances, Rusk states that those assurances "appear to be satisfactory,...although several minor questions still require clarification." Rusk points out, however, that the State Department intended to treat the issue not as a single episode, but as "a continuing subject and it [is] the intention of our intelligence agencies to maintain a continuing watch on Israel as on other countries to assure that nuclear weapons capabilities are not being proliferated." He added that, "at the moment, we are encouraging the Israelis to permit a qualified scientist from the United States or other friendly power to visit the Dimona installation."Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 99-101.
Document 2. On 31 January President Kennedy met former American Ambassador to Israel, Ogden Reid, who had resigned on 19 January. Kennedy wanted to know first hand about Dimona. Reid told him that he thought, "we can accept at face value Ben Gurion’s assurances that the reactor is to be devoted to peaceful purposes." He commented that an inspection of the Dimona site could be arranged, "if it is done on a secret basis."
Source: JFKL, NSF, box 118.
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 101-102.
Document 3. These two memos reveal the state of the American-Israeli discussions concerning the Dimona visit and Kennedy’s personal interest in the subject of Israel’s atomic energy activities. When Teddy Kollek, the director-general of Prime Minister’s office, visited Washington in later February, he told the Americans that a visit could be arranged in March. President Kennedy was brief about Kollek’s conversations and about the effort to find qualified American scientists to visit the reactor.
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 102-103.
Document 4. On 28 March 1961, Assistant Secretary Jones summoned Ambassador Harman to the State Department and told him that the United States had been faithfully waiting since early January for the promised invitation to visit Dimona, yet no such invitation arrived. He informed the Ambassador that the White House had inquired the previous day when the visit would take place and had requested a report on the matter by 31 March. The American lack of patience with the Israeli delays was evident. Ambassador Harman replied that he had no news about the visit from Jerusalem and doubted whether any action would be possible until after Passover, that is another ten days.
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 103-105.
Documents 5-6. On 30 March 1961, the Acting Secretary of State signed a "Memorandum for the President" on the subject of "Dimona Reactor." The State Department’s report included an account of the ongoing American-Israeli discussions on setting a date for the Dimona visit, accompanied with an updated chronology titled, "History of United States Interest in Israel’s Atomic Energy Activities."
The report stated that there was no likelihood of an invitation for a visit before 10 April, after Passover.
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 103-105.
Document 7. On 10 April 1961, Ambassador Harman informed the State Department that the American visit to Dimona was tentatively scheduled for the week of 15 May. Two days later Harman met the Secretary of State and officially proposed a meeting between President Kennedy and Prime Minister Ben Gurion. The Dimona visit was the tacit condition for the meeting. In the coming week practical discussions took place about the modalities of the visit. This document is a memorandum of Conversation between Assistant Secretary Jones and Minister Mordechai Gazit of the Israeli embassy about the Dimona visit.
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 103-105.
Documents 8-9. But even in later April Israel still proposed to have the American visit after the meeting between Ben Gurion and Kennedy. This issue was raised in meetings on 1 May and 4 May between Mordechai Gazit and Armin Meyer, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State. In the end Israel reaffirmed the original arrangement and agreed to receive the two American scientists on 18 May.
The available record does not explain why Israel wanted to postpone the technical visit after the meeting so one can only propose a plausible speculation. The Israelis might have thought that the manner in which they would present the Dimona project to the American visits, that is, how much they would reveal about its security aspects, would be dependent on the outcome of discussions between Ben Gurion and Kennedy, in particular how much room Ben Gurion would leave to weapons option in his discussions with the Kennedy. It seems that the Israelis did not want to commit Prime Minister Ben Gurion to a definitive policy line (to be determined by the way the reactor presented to the scientists) but rather to allow him a certain political latitude for his discussions with Kennedy on the purpose of the Dimona project.
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 103-105.
Document 10. By 5 May the State Department was in a position to inform the US Atomic Energy Commission of the final understanding concerning the visit of the AEC scientists at the Dimona reactor.
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 103-105.
Document 11. On 16 May, two days before the arrival of American scientists, Israeli senior diplomat Mordechai Gazit arrange an informal lunch meeting with met Philip Farley of the State Department to discuss the issue. The conversation was interesting because Gazit made a number of comments, perhaps a kind of trial balloon to test American intentions, hinting that Israel might have an interest in some form of nuclear option as deterrence for the future.
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 103-105
Document 12. These are the official bios of the two USAEC scientists that visited Dimona: Ulysses Staebler, assistant director of the AEC Reactor Development Division, and Jesse Croach, a heavy water expert employed by Dupont at the AEC Savannah River facility.
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For background information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 104-108.
Documents 13-14. The original report of the American visit to Dimona in May 1961 appears to be missing.
What was found at the National Archive are two related documents. First, a fifteen page draft titled "Notes on Visit to Israel," written by Staebler and Croach, which contains the raw data they collected during the visit. Second, a memorandum for National Security Advisor, McGeorge Bundy, based on debriefing sessions with the scientists.
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For more information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 105-108.
Documents 15-16. The hour and a half-long meeting between President Kennedy and Prime Minister Ben Gurion was anticlimactic. What clearly set the relaxed and amicable tone was the scientists’ report on the Dimona reactor that Kennedy received prior to the meeting. Ambassador Harman took notes for the Israeli side, while Feldman took notes for the American participants. The American and Israeli versions of the conversation are presented here in full.
From these minutes it is evident that, on the matter of Dimona, both leaders wanted to avoid a confrontation. Each leader seems to have had a sense of his own political limits. Neither wanted to rock the boat.
The nuclear issue was the reason for the New York meeting and the cause of Ben Gurion’s apprehensions, but it took up no more than ten to fifteen minutes of the conversation. Kennedy exerted no new pressure and Ben Gurion had no need to use all the arguments he had prepared. As his biographer wrote, "Ben Gurion felt relieved. The reactor was saved, at least for the time being."
Source: United States National Archives, Central Foreign Policy Files
For more information: Israel and the Bomb, pp. 108-111.