THE ULTIMATUM
SIR,-I think it fruitless to continue arguing with Mr. Erskine Childers, point by point, when we are totally disagreed about the general nature of what happened at the end of Octobei:, 1956. There are, however, two personal points in his letter (published in your issue of November 20) which require my reply.
First, Mr. Childers confronts the views which I now hold with those which I expressed in my book, WO Hours to Suez. Three full years have passed since that book was written. It was completed very hur- riedly, within a few weeks of the Sinai Campaign, and was serialised in the Daily Telegraph, beginning January 7, 1957. Since then I have paid another long visit to Israel, have collected and read a great deal more evidence, and have changed my mind on many matters, not least a few facts, such as the distance of Mitla from the Suez Canal. This is forty kilometres (or twenty-five miles). not forty miles, as stated in my book.
Secondly, and much more important, Mr. Childers doubts my anecdote about a message which I took to Mr. Ben-Gurion. Mr. Childers writes: The circum- stances are so extraordinary that . . . I cannot take the story seriously. Here is a message, allegedly from HM Government to the Premier of a foreign State, of so grave an import that it should only be sent by the highest diplomatic channels—yet a private citizen is chosen spontaneously, during an incidental luncheon, to deliver news to Ben-Gurion and suggest a course of action to him. . .
The whole point of my humble message was that it did not have to be taken seriously, that it did not come from HM Government, and could not possibly have been sent through diplomatic channels. I have no doubt that Mr. Ben-Gurion knew exactly how to interpret the message. It told him that there was a body of opinion within HM Government which strongly favoured helping Israel to relieve the in- tolerable conditions of the fedayeen raids across her frontiers etc. etc., provided that she did not attack Jordan, With whom HM Government had a Treaty. An attack against Egypt, if made at the right time, would have to be denounced publicly but would be secretly welcome.
Moreover, nearly all of us are something more than 'a private citizen.' I can imagine situations where Mr. Erskine Childers would prove a suitable messenger while Colonel Robert Henriques would not—and vice versa. In 1956 I was a member of what used to be called 'one of the leading Anglo-Jewish families,' established in this country for several centuries and firmly disinterested in Zionism from the date of the Balfour Declaration onwards. I had now 'seen the light' and was paying my first visit to Israel, warmly greeted by an ever-forgiving Government. A British Jew, I was an ex-regular soldier of the British Army, a full Colonel, credited with being an 'expert' on planning, and a writer with a modest, but inter- national, reputation. Certain preparations were made in Government and military circles, both in Britain and in Israel, for me to meet particular people, lecture to the Israel Staff College, etc. etc. Exactly the same has been true of many other people who have visited Israel at various times. But in September, 1956, it happened to be me. And there was nobody else quite like me—just as there is nobody quite like Mr. Erskine Childers. I think Mr. Childers is a little naïve in not realising how much of the world's affairs are con- ducted in just this kind of way.
On almost every other point expressed in Mr. Erskine Childers's letter I disagree completely. But we are all collecting evidence all the time, and are chang- ing our views as we do so. In another year or so we may get it right. For instance, since writing my article in the Spectator on November 6, I have learned that I was wrong in saying that the French cruiser shelled the Rafah positions in the Gaza strip without authority. In fact she had authority, but it was given at the very last moment, and the military commander of the Rafah operations was himself quite unaware that the cruiser was to take this action. But such errors on the part of myself and others do not affect what 1 am sure is the fundamental truth about collu- sion. I believe that there was no co-ordinated plan, either strategic or tactical, prepared at any time; that Ben-Gurion himself did not take his final decision to stage an operation in the Sinai Campaign until the early morning of Thursday, October 24; that even then the scope of the operation was left entirely un- decided, so that if necessary it could be represented as just another reprisal raid, but this time 'on the approaches to the Suez Canal.'
I feel pretty sure that France was informed almost immediately Ben-Gurion took his decision, but that she was not invited to participate in any shape or form, such as providing fighter cover for Tel Aviv, until, at the earliest, the last two days of Israel's mobilisation.- --Yours faithfully, ROBERT HENRIQUES
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