Ernest Graves
had a lot of trouble with the F4s that we supplied because that was a very
maintenance-intensive aircraft. They just didn't have the people that were used to this
type of work.
Q:
Is it conceivable, or does it happen, that we supply sophisticated weapons systems to
a society like that, then the weapons systems fails them, and we get blamed for it?
A:
We get blamed no matter what happens. It was very interesting in the case of Egypt.
They were not coming up with enough people, and the people they came up with were
not working long enough hours. And they weren't making progress on setting up their
parts supply and their maintenance system.
I used to have meetings with General Abu Ghazala, who is now Minister of Defense of
Egypt, when he was the attach here. He and I used to have meetings about what
needed to be done.
But on their part--I think their culture is like this--they never came to a meeting
without a litany of things that we had not done, that we should have done. That's just
their way of putting everybody on his guard.
Q:
Making you face the sun.
A:
We delivered the fins without the rockets, or it may have been that we delivered the
rockets without the fins. They couldn't even fly the airplanes at that stage, so the fact
that some of these rockets had been shipped over there without the fins was of some
concern, but had no effect on their operational capability at all.
But they always had their list of things that weren't right. I learned to say, "Fine." I
would try to get in advance from my action officer what they were going to complain
about, and often we would get the list. So when they'd go down their list, I'd say "All
right," and then I'd go down it and I would say, "Is there anything more to add on this
one?"
But this gets back to my point that I think the Arab culture is different from ours. I'm
not an expert on this. But just watching these negotiations, I saw that they were coming
at the problem differently from what I would have as a westerner.
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