352 • 18 WAR AND THE QUEST FOR PEACETHE WAR'S AFTERMATHThe June 1967 war had destroyed whatever influence the US had in Egypt
and Syria. A surprising result of the October 1973 war was that the US ac¬
tually regained that lost influence, thanks to Kissinger's diplomacy. Even
though he had never spent time in the Arab countries or shown much in¬
terest in them before he became secretary of state, he managed to deal
shrewdly with their leaders. Kissinger convinced them that only the US
could put real pressure on Jerusalem, strengthening their ties with Wash¬
ington. He tried various means to bring the Arabs and the Israelis to¬
gether; if one failed, he suggested another. In early November Egyptian
and Israeli army commanders met in a tent pitched near the Kilometer
101 marker on the Cairo-Suez road to identify and unsnarl the lines sepa¬
rating the two sides and to arrange for sending food and medical supplies
to Egypt's trapped Third Army. After these talks, Kissinger began organiz¬
ing a general peace conference, to be held in Geneva in late December un¬
der the joint presidency of the superpowers. Syria stayed away because the
PLO had not been invited, but Egypt and Israel both came. After a day of
opening speeches, the conference adjourned, as a technical committee be¬
gan working on disentangling the Israelis and Egyptians around Suez. The
Geneva Conference has been suspended ever since, although there was an
attempt to revive it in 1977.Shuttle Diplomacy
In January 1974 Kissinger began flying between Jerusalem and Aswan
(where Sadat spent the winter) and worked up a "separation of forces"
agreement by which Israel's troops were to withdraw from all lands west of
the canal and to establish its armistice line about 20 miles (35 km) east of
Suez (see Map 18.2). A new UN Emergency Force would patrol a buffer
zone east of the canal, enabling Sadat to keep the lands his forces had
taken and to regain those they had lost later in the war. The Israelis bene¬
fited because they could demobilize most of their reservists, who were
needed in their factories, shops, classrooms, and offices back home. So
pleased was Egypt with this agreement that Sadat helped persuade King
Faysal to lift the oil embargo. Syria, too, agreed to negotiate a disengage¬
ment of forces with Israel. This deal would prove much tougher to close. It
kept Kissinger in the Middle East for most of May 1974, but finally the Is¬
raelis agreed to give back to Syria what they had taken in the October War,
plus the main city of the Golan Heights, Kunaitra. A UN Disengagement
Observer Force was admitted into the Golan, but only for a six-month