great lengths for evidence and logic to defend themselves against what they see as a threat. >> i am honored to introduce our author the center for middle east studies this is a nonfiction thriller of a todaynary tale of combining real-world policy experience that is fascinating

cold war era culminating in president eisenhower from 1858 the presentation followed by q&a and book signing please join me to welcome him today. [applause] >> it's good to know. first of all thank you for coming tonight on july 151958 at roughly 3:00 p.m. in the afternoon landing on a beirut beach the marines came ashore anticipating this is d-day

facing a hostile audience but in fact what they ran into was onbanese and then they don't have the picture of anybody on the beach and those rushing to the store literally as they charged up the beach weapons loaded ready to go to war they charge down the beach with vendors selling coca-cola and cigarettes and other lebanese delights. it turns out in large numbers here you can see taxis pulling up and the marines were

landing in lebanon and the very vicious civil war between christians and muslims and expected to go into combat the lebanese army regards as invaders the sovereignty and sanctity of lebanon. the muslims saw them coming assure those that were trying to hold on to power for an extra second term. in germany tactical nuclear weapons were prepared to be airlifted to the beach at the 8d air force division was put on alert to reinforce the beachhead so while there was an approach in very real terms

this could have turned into a disaster. the first time us combat troops ever went into a mission in the middle east the first combat mission. fortunately it turned out well only one army sergeant died and was killed in sniper fire later on they could lead after a few months i will come back to that. but it began the tradition of american combat operations in the middle east. and of course as we all know subsequent missions did not turn out as happily as beirut 1958 in fact the second intervention in 1982 turned out as a disaster and the death of over 240 american

marines. to look back on the first mission to gain some understanding of what was going on a few hours after the marines landed it is six hours earlier in washington president eisenhower went on tv why he sent the marines into harm's way one year before eisenhower had laid out the eisenhower doctrine the first time an american president said to the american people know president until then has ever identified the middle east and for what he laid out is crucial to american interest one is a whale. the second was the middle east

was the birthplace of those judaism and christianity and islam and in the context of the cold war the united states could not allow atheist communism to take over the birthplace of the three great religions. it's interesting how eisenhower in 1957 did not identify the defense of israel as a strategic vital interest of the united states. the subsequent american president would ever look at it those ways. on july 15, 1958 with the marines coming ashore there was a new explanation as to why they were there. essentially he said the crew the previous day the 14th of july in which the most pro-western government in the middle east had been

overthrown was a direct threat to american national interest the government in iraq was in a very brutal and violent coup even by middle eastern standards and i can identify the coup as a starting point for the entire middle east in the soviet union and international communism. if they did not respond to the coup a third world war could start in the middle east and if the loss was as significant china as communism in 1848. it is a remarkable statement also completely divorced from the facts on the ground.

had very little to do with reality and iraq and the east and less than forthcoming. the real concern is not communism but this man. passer was the charismatic and young and very attractive president of egypt taking power of the coup in 1952 and then to lift an audience with his words and to survive literally on stage to have an assassin fireta a bullet and then never stopped speaking it isis charismatic. the winner of the 1956 suez crisis in which they disputed

a remarkable outcome in part because eisenhower had leaned toward egypt and in februar february 1958 syria and egypt united together the united power of the republic today we have forgotten arab nationalism as a motivating factoris but in the fifties the adf one arab nation from the gulf to the ocean from oman to morocco was one of the most powerful ideologies in the world and nasser was at the center of that it is ironic because in many ways he was the protége of the cia they didn't put him in office but

even before to be in contact with nasser and the cia identified arab nationalism as the wave of the future the united states wanted to be on the wave of the future and as the communism in the middle east. the individual associated with this policy and those who put the shop back in power in 1953 removing from power in iraq also the initial person who

dealt with nasser. very shortly after taking power asked the cia for money in order to buy arms as a military general in the war against israel and naturally one of thega things he wanted to do was reward the egyptian army to build up the military capabilities. the cia gave him a very small stipend between three and $5 million which would not buy a very many arms. and instead spend the money on building a radio tower for the voice of the arabs for going the 19 fifties radio was the equivalent and it is known in egypt as roosevelt's direction. i will not go farther than

that. the relationship between the united states and egypt soured over the years. with that to have weapons and that soured relations and by 1958 relations between uae and egypt deteriorated significantly february 1958 egypt and syria united and in response to that and the federation of arab monarchies. and march 3rd 1958 the king of saudi arabia between richard nixon and dwight eisenhower and then to

overthrow the government to wake up the republic. and then they broke up a plot to assassinate nasser and then not only with the airplane but they canceled checks signed by the king to the plot makers. don't sign the check if you're going to overthrow the regime. so by 1958 the alternative to eisenhower. the head of saudi arabia and the two holy mosques. was a much more moderate pro-western version in the

eisenhower administration hoped they could use himio to counter president nasser. one year before and the first saudi king to visit the plan for nine days ended up lasting 12 days. the king had indicated to bring their almost so many studies in the delegation they literally set up tents on lafayette square to house the rest of the delegation it must've been an extraordinary site. i would like to say he was wined and dined that given great profile by the eisenhower administration so

despite the plot was a severe throwback within the saudi royal family and then in a matter of days stripped of all of his power and gave it to the crown prince faisal staying in power as king bed essentially powerless after that. faisal was much less favorable to the united states. so that was one great big setback for the united states. and then another setback in the region and the lebanese president was one of the few arab leaders but king hussein at this point is in his early twenties and then 80 percent

palestinian and the cia uncovered the plot by tapping the phone of the defense attaché was plotting with the egyptian counterpart to overthrow the keying and late june of 1958 the cia gave all the information to the jordanians. so the king turned to his brother-in-law the king of jordan king faisal the second and you can see how young they are that they agreed iraq would send a brigade of the

iraqi army in order to help stabilize the jordanian situation but what they selected for those that have the plot against king faisal. as we said earlier it's a very violent plot the brigade was moving through baghdad in the early morning and that ammunition which is very unusual instead of headed towards jordan but the defense ministry into line up the machine gun all of them in the and the de facto over the last

20 years found one day later and executed on the spot and a blow a series of events and the coup was led by this man nobody knew who this guy was. a complete unknown the americans didn't know and the russians didn't know. a complete unknown factor. the plotters may or may not have been egyptian but that those sympathies are with him.

and that is filled with people holding up pictures of nasser. the tanks have his picture all over them. and then to come to the conclusion it was the egyptian sponsored coup. the lebanese at that point also this gentleman was the president of lebanon in the 19 fifties lebanon then and today highly sectarian government is based on the fiction even by ut58 was no longer true but the element was the colonial master of the twenties and thirties and then the speaker

of parliament and by convention the president only serves one term but camille in 1958 was seeking a second term everybody knew it. and that resulted in the civil war between christians and muslims but it was messier than that the patriarch which was the dominant christian church in lebanon actually supported the muslim rebels it was a very confused situation and those intricacies were far more than most americans with any knowledge of middle east wanted to get into. on the afternoon of the 14th of july eisenhower convened the national security council and turned to the director of central intelligence dulles to

give an appraisal situation. remember in the eisenhower administration we had the usual see the secretary of state john foster dulles was the brother of the director of the central intelligence. something like that may never happen like that again in american history. allen gave the most bleak picture you could imagine that the coup in iraq was egyptian inspired lead to the overthrow of the lebanese government and very quickly to overthrow saudi arabia and kuwait and the gulf states in that entire region to fall into the hands of nasser within a matter of days unless nasser did something his brother said if

it falls to nasser falls to international communism in the middle east and the world's oil supplies will be in the hands of the soviets. all of this first of all it wasn't at all clear the coup in iraq was egyptian inspired and although he did take arms is not exactly so eisenhower panicked and it's very interesting to read his memoirs because he says i felt like i had to do something. now eisenhower the hero of the day the greatest year of the 20h century was smart enough to realize unlike the successors that while invading iraq it's a really hard thing to do but

invading lebanon is easy to do because united states has a large fleet in the eastern mediterranean so when those 2000 marines went ashore they were backed up by 70 ships including three carrier battle groups. it was goliath and a midget battlefield. by invading lebanon and going to the defense of camille the united states was doing something too prevent from sweeping the region. he was very popular in lebanon when he first went to syria after the merger 350,000 lebanese came to damascus to hear him speak. a country that had a little less than one.5 million people

that's an awful lot of people to get in their cars and trucks to go to another country to hear his speech. the civil war that broke out pitted the muslims and the united arab republic supported the rebels in lebanon giving them w arms and assistance and that was undisputed. asking for the united states torv intervene repeatedly on his behalf but then intel that eisenhower finally agreed and the marines followed. but now serve for his part was in yugoslavia at the time and immediately secretly flew to moscow which the cia discovered very quickly which of course reinforce the paranoia that nasser was really in the hands of these

russians. the russians and egyptians agree the really important event in the middle east july 1958 was not beirut the important issue was baghdad when they decided to let the events play themselves out while they frantically try to figure out who was running the new government in baghdad. the situation on the ground in beirut was extremely dicey on the 15th and 16th lebanese army which is mostly christian officers and mostly muslim troops regarded the intervention as a violation of sovereignty and prepared to fight back. the american ambassador on the scene robert mcclintock was advising eisenhower not to send the troops over and over

including on the 14th coming up with a brilliant solution he went to the commander of the lebanese army a christian and said why don't we pretend you invited the americans to help stabilize the t situation they are not here as intervention but as guests of the lebanese army as their host. he went along with this and for the remainder of the american deployment in beiru beirut, technically the marines were escorted by patrols of the lebanese army it was fiction but avoided a showdown. mcclintock also got the assistance of undersecretary of state or number three in

the state department sent out by eisenhower with instructions to tell mcclintock to get on the program he got on the ground is that i will support the ambassador's efforts to defuse the conflict and to gather the under secretary of state robert murphy and mcclintock began engaging theh lebanese powers this is a not particularly good picture of them sitting on the sofa on the far side of what they agreed is that he would be removed from office and the general would become the next president. this is exactly what nasser wanted from the beginning so in effect the american intervention in lebanon 1958

accomplish what egypt wanted all along to get rid of him and to replace him. mcclintock and murphy and eisenhower they agreed this was the smart way out of the crisis. one g.i. was killed in the intervention by sniper fire from the muslims but by octobe october 25th 1958 the last american troops in the intervention had gone home. the civil war was over and operation was more or less a success story. in one case it's all about eisenhower in his eight years in power avoided sending troops into combat he did not

intervene in the struggle between mainland communism and generally avoided sending troops into combat which is understandable and as a general eisenhower never fought in combat himself but saw the results much more than most people did and he wanted to avoid that. july 141958 the one time in those eight years when he essentially panicked and decided to do something else. murphy went on to baghdad to discover he was in iraq he nationalist no interest to be upon of egypt or the soviet union and interested in running his own country. there several things to learn but first the middle east is a

very unpredictable place anybody who tells you they know what will happen doesn't know what they are talking about surprises come up all the time many times they are unpleasant surprises the lesson is don't panic. let it play out. given some time don't reach the worst conclusion overnight don't jump to the worst possible outcome give it time to play out. one of the reasons i wrote beirut 1958 is because i was there. i was five years old. that's me in the outfit that's my brother trying to say i have no idea who this is my

father was with the united nations when i was two years old then we moved to beirut in 1957 it was called the paris of the middle east and literally was the most open and fun place to live in the entire region it sits right on the mediterranean with the mountains of lebanon right behind it you could go swimming in the morning and ski inn the afternoon of course when the civil war began it went sour in a t hurry and in the end my father stayed my mother and brother and i were evacuated to naples italy where we stayed with the american fleet until the civil

war had wound down and then we went back in. that is my personal account of the story and with that i'm happy to take your questions or comments. [applause] >> obviously very complicated answer but why do you think the civil war was resolved with negotiations of those lasted longer crack. >> partly to have a mediator in the united states after an awkward beginning to put it mildly shifted the focused.

mcclintock in particular had already established a great network of ties with the leaders and was able to use that to his advantage and negotiations even more importantly 1958 lebanon is not about the arab-israeli conflict the palestinian movement as we know had not developed yet the palestinians were just refugees they didn't have a real political profile. when she got to post 1967 era of the palestinian community had staked out its own position and the conflict was lebanon was a battlefield bringing in syrians and

saudi's and he gets much more complicated to come up with a solution. >> thank you for this great presentation and coming out tonight we will have a book signing appear as well. thank you. [applause] [inaudible conversations]