Ernest Graves
"Well, we won't insist on interpreting the agreement. We'll just allow a loose
interpretation," which is what they did.
Q:
Did the embassy try to get involved, do you know--well, to be blunt and explicit about
it--did they try to get [Lieutenant] General [Bennett L.] Lewis out of the program?
A:
Well, I don't really know what happened. Ben was rather forthright in telling them what
he thought was right and wrong.
I think many of the criticisms that Ben made were probably valid. There were too many
cooks in there. It's conceivable to me that the Corps of Engineers' managers in Israel
and the contractors were not doing the job they should have in setting up the
management structure, getting all this into a computer and so forth so they could keep
track of it. From the reports I received, they did poorly on that. This whole business of
getting the requirement cleanly stated was not done well. Whether this was due to the
personalities of the leaders or what, I think the fact that the thing was divided between
the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers couldn't have helped.
Ben was pretty tough on this. He was the kind of guy that could get it done. However,
a lot of people got bruised in the process. I guess they decided that the damage being
done by this wasn't worth it.
I think if I wanted to get something like that set up and running, there are few people
in the Corps that would do a better job at this than Ben Lewis. He is tough-minded. I
think he was right in what he wanted to do. Possibly his methods didn't take adequate
account of the sensibilities of the Israelis or the embassy or something. That's possible.
I can see the Israelis complaining to the ambassador about Ben. If Paul Hartung and
Moshe Bar-Tov were over there trying to tell Jack Gilkey what to do, I can see Ben
going over there and telling them to mind their own business.
Q:
Yes, I'm sure he did.
A:
Then I can see some political type going to Sam Lewis and saying that Ben Lewis was
not giving adequate consideration to Israel's needs.
Q:
This program caused him a great amount of pain.
A:
Ben saw this as an important program he had been given responsibility for. He wanted
to get it right. Then to be made persona non grata is pretty tough.
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