have launched from Fort Bragg with the brigade if I was going to Seneca, I now guessed that I was most likely being sent to someplace like Honduras, since the Nicaraguans had recently been intensifying their activities in that neck of the woods.
The next morning, I caught a ride to Washington with Lieutenant General Jack MacMull, the XVIII Airborne Corps Commander. At the Pentagon, General Vessey's people told me to go around the building for the rest of the day and learn everything I could about the U.S. program in Lebanon, because the Chairman and I would be leaving for there that night. Vessey would spend three days in the country, and then I'd remain 'as the Chairman's and the SECDEF's man on the ground.'
For the rest of the day, I got briefings from principal staff officers of the Offices of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Secretary of Defense, and learned the details about why I was going: It was taking too long for orders and information to be passed over the existing chain of command from Beirut to General Vessey and Secretary Weinberger, and the information they were receiving was so filtered through the various links in the chain that it was questionable whether it fully represented what was actually happening to the Lebanese government, the Lebanese Army, the Israeli Army, and the U.S. Marines at the airport.
The existing chain of command to Lebanon ran from Washington to NATO headquarters in Mons, Belgium, to the European command in Stuttgart, to the commander of U.S. Naval Forces Europe in Naples, to the deputy commander of U.S. Naval Forces Europe in London, to the commander of the 6th Fleet in Gaeta, Italy, to the commander of the Amphibious Task Force off the coast of Lebanon, to the commander of the Landing Force also off the coast of Lebanon, and finally to the commander of the Marine Amphibious Unit at the Beirut airport. This chain was the normal arrangement for fighting the Cold War, and also for handling anything else that might occur in the European area of responsibility, but it was not an efficient arrangement for dealing with the fast-breaking and complex situation in Lebanon.
At 7:00 P.M. that evening, General Vessey and I departed from Andrews Air Force Base for Beirut. En route, we talked about the situation in Lebanon — the personalities involved, the U.S. assistance program, the impact of occupying powers, ongoing diplomatic initiatives, and so on — until about midnight, when we tried to get a little sleep before we hit Beirut and a full schedule of tough meetings on the U.S. military assistance program. If that had any serious shortfalls, we needed to find out about them.
We arrived in Beirut around midmorning, and went directly to the Ministry of Defense for a meeting with General Ibrahim Tannous, chief of staff of the Lebanese armed forces. Tannous was a soldiers soldier, revered by Lebanese lighting men for his bravery during a battle with the Syrians (he'd lost an eye in the process). Though the Lebanese army was then at best a marginal fighting force, he was doing everything possible to rebuild it sufficiently to take over security responsibilities for all Lebanon when the Syrian and Israeli occupying forces withdrew. Tannous was extremely pleased with U.S. military assistance, and specifically with the training and equipment Colonel Tim Fintel was providing. Fintel, an Armor officer, was chief of the Office for Military Cooperation. Most training for reraising the Lebanese armed forces was being conducted by U.S. Special Forces.
General Tannous had organized an ethnically balanced staff, which was functioning well together: Major General Hakim, a Druze, was his deputy commander; his director of personnel was a Sunni Muslim, Colonel Simon Quassis; a Maronite Christian was director of intelligence, Brigadier General Abbas Hamdan; a Shiite Muslim was director of operations; and his director of logistics was also a Sunni Muslim.
After eight years of atrophy while the civil war had raged in one form or another, the Lebanese army had done little but attempt to maintain order. Now Tannous was trying to build an army that represented the current ethnic mix of the population (Christian, Sunni Muslim, Shiite Muslim, and Druze), rather than the population at the time of the 1932 census. His cfforts were beginning to pay off. The army, with U.S. help, was rapidly becoming a cohesive and effective force.
Three brigades had already been formed and equipped, and a fourth brigade's training was well under way. When the Israeli army withdrew, Tannous planned to achieve stability in south Lebanon and security along Israel's northern border by employing a brigade of approximately 2,400 men. He would then provide internal security by employing two brigades in Beirut. Within a year and a half, the Lebanese army was expected to grow to seven brigades and be able to take responsibility for the security of all Lebanon.
Over the next three days, Vessey and I met with Ambassador Reginald Bartholomew; President Amin Gemayel; General Moshi Levy, commander of Israeli forces; the commanders of the French and Italian forces; Vice Admiral Jerry Tuttle, commander of the Sixth Fleet; Colonel Tim Geraghty, commander of the 24th Marine Amphibious Unit; and Colonel Tom Fintel. We also visited the training camp and observed the training the SF team was conducting. They were living in the Cadmos Hotel in West Beirut and the training site was in East Beirut.
It was a very productive time. All the key leaders—
We were particularly impressed with Tannous's leadership and his plan for building an ethnically representative army. We were convinced that given sufficient time and the opportunity for an orderly relief of the Israeli forces, Tannous and his army could likely provide the stability necessary for the Lebanese government to regain control of the country.
As time passed, General Tannous and I became close professional friends. We worked well with each other.
On the way to the airport for his departure. General Vessey laid out what he expected me to do in Lebanon: 'It's obvious,' he told me, 'that the Lebanese army is the only effective institution of government to which we can tic our assistance program. That means I want you to work closely with General Tannous in coordinating the timing of Israel's withdrawal with the development of Tannous's forces, so the Lebanese will be able to effectively relieve the Israeli forces. We want to eliminate the possibility of a void that will encourage renewed fighting by the factions.
'I want you to report to me daily over the SATCOM and the fax machine I'll leave with you. But also keep EUCOM [U.S. European Command] informed of what's going on here.
'One other thing: You're going to be the military adviser to the President's special envoy to Lebanon [at this time Robert MacFarlane], and you'll come back to Washington every two to three months to brief the Joint Chiefs.'
MacFarlane and I soon developed a very close relationship. My primary function was to be his conduit both to Tannous and to the Israeli forces in Lebanon. But this brought an even more important benefit: Tannous knew personally most of the senior leadership of the Syrian cabinet and armed forces — their backgrounds, their motivation, and their 'leanings.' This was vital information.
When MacFarlane visited other Arab nations, I traveled with him as part of his team. In this capacity, I provided information about current military needs and U.S. military assistance. Specifically, I would tell him what each country might ask us for — as well as how the Defense Department would view that request.
Over the next couple of weeks, I lived, like the Special Forces trainers, at the Cadmos Hotel. Each morning I went to the British Embassy in West Beirut or the Ambassador's residence at Yarze, a Beirut neighborhood, where embassy activities were also conducted. After the 1983 bombing, the British had allowed the U.S. to use their embassy, but the heavy fighting and the terrorist threat sometimes made travel unsafe for Ambassador Bartholomew, forcing some operations to be conducted from his residence.
Wherever I was, Embassy or residence, I read the latest intelligence traffic received by the station chief, Bill Buckley. (Buckley was good at his job. He was successfully rebuilding the network of agents lost in the Embassy bombing, and we got along well, but — predictably — he was not always cooperative about sharing information with anyone outside his office.) From there, I went to the Ministry of Defense to get a rundown on the security situation from General Tannous. At some point, I'd also meet with Ambassador Bartholomew (an outstanding man in every respect — always open with me and I with him) to bring him up-to-date and receive instructions from him. Each evening I sent a detailed fax message to General Vessey (the same information went to the EUCOM staff-usually to the watch officer, Lieutenant Colonel Charlie Wilhelm in the J-3 Operations Directorate).
I met frequently with Israeli intelligence officers; and at least once, but most times twice, each week, I visited the Marines at the airport to brief Colonel Tim Geraghty and his staff on these meetings and on what I'd
