Eleventh Hour for AWACS

By GEORGE J. CHURCH

In quest of a compromise that no one will like

Ronald Reagan was reluctant to believe it. But last week he finally got the message after Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker called at the White House, bringing with him Prince Bandar ibn Sultan, a commander of the Saudi Arabian air force and a member of the royal family. Baker told both President and prince that the White House would have to renegotiate with Riyadh the terms on which the U.S. proposes to sell five sophisticated AWACS radar planes and other military equipment to Saudi Arabia. Otherwise both houses of Congress were certain to vote down the $8.5 billion deal that Reagan will officially present to Congress this week.

Reagan and Bandar agreed to discuss possible compromises, and the prince then accompanied Baker to a long meeting in the office of Ohio Democrat John Glenn, a leading Senate opponent of the original sale terms. National Security Adviser Richard Allen and Reagan's friend Republican Senator Paul Laxalt of Nevada joined the discussion. The Americans suggested placing the AWACS planes, the first of which is to be delivered in 1985, under joint U.S.-Saudi command. But after conferring with his government, Prince Bandar on Friday broke bad news to Allen: the Saudis would not agree, because restrictions on their use of the planes would humiliate them in the eyes of their Arab neighbors.

That does not necessarily mean the deal is doomed. TIME has learned that Bandar said the Saudis were willing to listen to other U.S. proposals; they just might, for example, permit American crewmen aboard the planes. But it is difficult to see how any arrangement short of joint command would convince skeptical Senators 1) that the planes would be used for their stated purpose of giving early warning of any air assault on Saudi Arabia's vital oilfields, rather than to spy on Israeli aircraft movements; and 2) that the planes would not fall into unfriendly hands if the Riyadh monarchy were overthrown by a leftist revolution. Moreover, the eleventh hour has struck. If Reagan indeed presents the deal to Congress on schedule, Sept. 30, as the Saudis insist, it cannot then be amended; it must be voted up or down as is, or withdrawn.

Without a new compromise, the outlook is grim. During the five months since the Administration announced the proposed sale, doubts about it have spread widely on Capitol Hill--fanned assiduously by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a leading organization in the Jewish-American lobby. Indeed, nose counts by both sides last week showed as many as 65 Senators committed or leaning against the sale with only twelve firmly in favor. (Defeat of the AWACS sale in the Democratic-controlled House is taken for granted, but the deal will go through anyway unless the Republican-controlled Senate also votes no.)

The Administration tried to change those counts last week by launching a lobbying blitz. For three days Air Force officers took ten Senators, 59 Representatives and assorted congressional aides on guided tours of an AWACS plane parked at Andrews Air Force Base outside Washington.

Three squads of Administration briefers, nicknamed the red, white and blue teams, descended on doubtful Senators to press their case. Their standard argument was that the U.S. must help the Saudi regime defend itself, because of both its oil and its moderating influence on other Arab states. Said Reagan of the doubting Senators: "They are literally doing away with our ability to continue to bring peace to the Middle East."

Administration lobbyists last week added an ironic and rather contradictory contention: the Saudis would get only a downgraded AWACS, equipped with 1960s technology. Thus, they said, the planes could not spy effectively on Israel and the Soviets would learn few if any U.S. secrets if they should get their hands on a Saudi AWACS. The Senators simply did not believe it. After Allen had made that argument to him, Glenn asked sarcastically: "Then how in hell can we protect the Persian Gulf?"

Even if the White House should negotiate a compromise that would enable the sale to squeak through the Senate, no one will be very happy. Reagan will have been forced to back down in part from a strongly held position; the Saudis will be annoyed by restrictions on their control of the planes; the Israelis will be dismayed by any AWACS sale to the Saudis under any conditions.

But the consequences of an outright defeat of the deal would be far worse for the Administration. Domestically, Reagan would suffer a grievous blow to his prestige in dealing with Congress, at a tune when he needs all the support he can muster for the second round of budget cuts. In the eyes of much of the Arab world, the AWACS deal--rightly or wrongly--has become a test of Israeli influence over Washington. If it should be voted down, many Arabs would conclude the U.S. will not, perhaps cannot, pursue an evenhanded Middle East policy. Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger last week summed it up this way: the original offer might have been a mistake, but it would be a far more serious error to renege on the sale now. --By George J. Church.

Reported by Laurence I. Barrett and Johanna McGeary/Washington

With reporting by Laurence I. Barrett, Johanna McGeary/Washington

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