200. Telegram From the Embassy Office in Pakistan to the Department of State11. Source: National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Central Files 1964–66, POL 27 INDIA–PAK. Secret; Immediate. Repeated to Karachi, London, New Delhi, USUN, and CINCMEAFSA for POLAD, and passed to the White House, USIA, DOD, and CIA.
Rawalpindi, September 10, 1965, 1005Z.
52. Deptel 312 to Karachi.22. See footnote 2, Document 194. Suspension military aid shipments to Pakistan and India.
..Bhutto read full text which I delivered to him and listened attentively to my exposition of what the action did and did not signify...[the] notice to Karachi and New Delhi that effective September 10 no further commercial licenses for the export of munitions to India and Pakistan were to be issued. In addition, all shipments of munitions to the two countries for which valid licenses had been issued but which had not left the United States were stopped...After long pause he described our action in tone of foreboding as a fateful one which adhered to, would mean that Pak-U.S. relations could not be the same again. He termed the decision an act not of an ally and not even that of a neutral. Rather, it was an act which would be of net benefit to the Indian side. He argued that India with its varied sources of foreign supply, its larger domestic armaments industry and its greater industrial capacity and reserves could stand the loss of U.S. supply flow far better than could Pakistan, which had placed all of its reliance on the U.S. and was almost totally dependent on this one source...Said
Paks would fight on to finish with sticks and stones and with bare hands if necessary...
...I sought to stem Bhutto tirade by pointing out that we were convinced that action was for preservation of Pakistan as well as subcontinent as a whole; that unconditional acceptance now by Pakistan of Security Council's and SYG's proposals would in any event protect Pakistan from victimization by superior military power of India; that our action was not punitive or threatening, but an unwillingness (demanded by U.S. public opinion and feelings of humanitarianism) to fuel a destructive conflict totally irreconcilable with the principles of peaceful negotiation and settlement which we believed were the only ones which would work. I told Bhutto it seemed to us that GOP was refusing to abandon the resort to force unless it attained in advance full agreement to its basic objectives as to Kashmir. It was not sensible to assume that this most intractable of world issues that has defied all solution efforts for 18 years could be settled now by the attachment of a Pakistani-prescribed rider to a cease-fire agreement...I told him he knew the matter with us was not one of dollars and cents in this hour of trial but of
doing the best we could to stop the holocaust and start the search for a peaceful settlement which could endure.
The difficult meeting ended on a somber note with an oppressive feeling on my part that more ominous developments may be in the air.
