ABSTRACT
It is nowadays taken for granted that the US–Israeli relationship has an important military-strategic dimension. However, this dimension was totally absent during the first 20 years of Israel’s existence. Israel had, from its inception, highly valued its relations with the United States but had also been acutely aware of the constraints the US had set on the military- strategic bilateral cooperation. The existence of this void in the otherwise crucially important relationship can best be illustrated by evoking a somewhat forgotten episode that occurred in the years 1955–56. Egypt had then concluded an important arms deal with the Soviet bloc in September 1955. Israel’s Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, deeply concerned, sent urgent, not to say desperate, appeals to US President Dwight D. Eisenhower asking for arms, but received evasive replies. Ben-Gurion did his best to explain to Eisenhower, through several notes and public statements, that the complete upset of the delicate military balance between Israel and Egypt as a result of the massive injection of Soviet arms was cause for serious alarm. Thus, for example, he wrote Eisenhower. (14 February 1956): ‘Therefore, I appeal to you, Mr President, in the name of my government and my people, not to leave Israel without adequate capacity for its self defence.’ 1 Ben-Gurion also made the point that he was dispatching this note three months after his first appeal to the United States. Reporting to the Knesset he said he felt obligated to alert the Knesset and world public opinion to the terrible danger lying ahead because of the abundance of arms flowing into Egypt.
