ABSTRACT
By 1957 the political climate had become so charged that Charles Malik's earlier request for help from Washington for the forthcoming elections was supported by independent US diplomatic and intelligence assessments in Beirut. Soviet Minister Kiklev visited Beirut after the Melnikov mission of February 1956, with offers in communication and road transport, hydroelectric dam projects, and nuclear reactors. In Beirut, as US Intelligence estimates predicted, the impact of Suez on the Sham'un regime was thoroughly undermining, deepening existing political divisions and resulting in repeated cabinet changes. At the beginning of 1958, precisely at the time when the US Embassy in Beirut was pressing the State Department to clarify its position with respect to the presidential succession crisis in Beirut, US participation in the group's activities increased. Malik's claim was exaggerated, but it was not entirely false. US arms had begun to flow into Beirut in accord with the James Richards Mission in early June and mid-July.
