POLICY AND POLITICS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-01448R000401580039-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 25, 2012
• Sequence Number: 39
• Publication Date: September 18, 1988
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/05/25: CIA-RDP99-01448R000401580039-9
FOREIGN AFFAIRS I Flora Lewis
Policy and Politics
STAT
The Washington Post
The New York Times F_ 23
The Washington Times
The Wall Street Journal
The Christian Science Monitor
New York Daily News
USA Today
The Chicago Tribune
Date I$ SPA
European officials, East as well
as West, are unusually relaxed
about American elections this
year. They don't feel they have a big
stake in the outcome, not because U.S.
decisions are any less vital to them
nowadays but because they don't ex-
pect much change whoever wins.
Despite the candidates' efforts to
sharpen their profiles, foreign policy
is not a major issue in the broad
sense. That's one reason Vice Presi-
dent Bush keeps harping on "experi-
ence" rather than on anything sub-
stantive, although it comes a bit oddly
from Ronald Reagan's running mate
in 1980. They made no point of it then.
In any case, it's misleading. Mr.
Bush has had a lot of foreign expo-
sure, but that's not at all the same as
grappling with decisions.
People who were at the U.N. when
he was Ambassador there saw an
energetically back-slapping lobbyist,
which is a part of the job, but say he
didn't seem well informed on U.S.
plans nor did he try to influence them.
Foreign diplomats who watched him
in Beijing say he had no grasp of what
was going on. And a Washing on past
inquiry on the impression he made at
the C.I.A. reported people who
worked with him there savtne ar
never took a stand or made a recom-
mendation when controversies a rose.
It is true that with the exception
perhaps of Latin America, U.S. opin-
ion and circumstances have set the
likely course of foreign policy for
some years ahead. There will be ne-
gotiations with the Soviet Union and
with America's trading partners, con-
tinued troubles in the Middle East, at-
tempts to contain and if possible re-
solve regional conflicts. The options
for Washington are narrow on these
issues. There is no question of isola-
tionism or dramatic new initiatives.
A Republican President who takes
care to assuage hard-liners might
have an easier time getting new arms
control treaties ratified, although the
really hard ones will fight any agree-
ments with the Soviets, and a Demo-
cratic President is likely to establish
better working relations with Con-
gress.
But the foreigners overlook two im-
portant points that influence policy.
One is Presidential style, not only in
presenting issues to the public and in
personal encounters with other lead-
ers, but also in facing decisions. A
large part of policy trouble in the
Reagan Administration comes from
leaving issues open, so that fights be-
tween the State and Defense Depart-
ments, for example, went on until
events imposed the choice.
The other key difference is in the
people whom the President names to
carry out the policy. Mr. Reagan put
an unprecedented number of political
appointees in ambassadorial and
ranking departmental jobs, many
without government or foreign ex-
perience. The foreign service suf-
fered considerably. Some nonprofes-
sionals bring an incisive, fresh ap-
proach, others have made dreadful
gaffes in recent years.
Gov. Michael Dukakis's big foreign
policy speech last week was evidently
based on ideas articulated by Gra-
ham Allison Jr., dean of the Kennedy
School at Harvard. Critics hinted that
that smacked of plagiarism, but it's
nonsense. Of course a President has
to rely on advisers, and it matters
that he choose knowledgeable and
sound ones, not just slick media con-
sultants. If Mr. Allison was an exam-
ple of where Mr. Dukakis looks, he
was a good one.
It would be interesting to know who
advised Mr. Bush to use the line of at-
tack blaming Mr. Dukakis for failing
to attribute all the changes in the
Soviet Union and the Communist
world to the Reagan Administration.
Mr. Dukakis has endorsed current
Reagan policy on dealing with Mi-
khail Gorbachev, while Mr. Bush
seems to be backing away a bit to
please the ultra-right.
But of course Mr. Dukakis is right in
analyzing Moscow-'s extraordinary
shifts as the result primarily of Soviet
internal problems and wise to show he
understands the limits of U.S. influ-
ence. The facts are that Mr. Gorba-
chev's attempts at transformation are
the cumulative result of two genera-
tions of general success in the West
and undeniable failure in the East.
Even Czechoslovak officials, the hard-
liners of the East, now concede that
central planning doesn't work and that
the problem is how to reform it without
getting into worse trouble.
Mr. Dukakis is right in pointing out
that the defense budget can no longer
be increased. It is "soft on defense"
to try to solve all questions by throw-
ing money at them. Now, the difficult
choices, evaded during the Reagan
buildup, will have to be made.
Naturally, foreigners don't see any-
thing serious in a debate about pledg-
ing allegiance to the flag and counting
diplomatic handshakes. ^
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/05/25: CIA-RDP99-01448R000401580039-9