of newsmen, open doors for businessmen, and attend to visiting Congressmen. Besides, today's Ambassador is expected to get away from the capital and to acquire first-hand knowledge of the country's political, social and economic life. What the people are saying is often more important than the gossip of high society, and his business suits and even more informal attire may wear out sooner than his white tie and tails. Posts, of course, vary greatly. In an emerging African nation, the host government may turn to the American Ambassador for advice on economics, or administration, or military affairs, or even internal political matters which would seldom, if ever, be sought by older and more established governments. In some areas, work with regional and international organizations is an added dimension for American diplomacy. With respect to reporting, 50 years ago it may have been sufficient to cover the affairs of the court and the capital. No more. Now an Ambassador is called upon to view the society as a whole, to analyze the forces working for change, and to relate the problems of his country to wider problems and policies. Hence his reports must penetrate more deeply while the horizon of relevance has widenedand at the same time the number of reporters other than the Ambassador has grown with the number of agencies making up the American establishment. Thus each of the elements of an Ambassador's traditional responsibility has altered. Meanwhile, a new executive role has been laid upon our Ambassadors. Since World War II the American Executive Branch has reproduced itself abroad in something approaching its full panoply of separate agencies-with all that implies in terms of overlapping jurisdictions, incompatible assignments, mutual jealousies, surplus staff, and the ruminations of innumerable committees. Not only State, but AID, USIS, the service attachés (Army, Navy, and Air Force), military assistance advisory groups (MAAGS), CIA, Treasury, Agriculture, science attachés, and the Peace Corps may be found at our major posts. There may also be an area military commander. In Britain, for example, with which we have old ties and many common interests, at least 44 American agencies are represented in the Embassy. In the Soviet Union, where the "court" is still a dominating fact of life, the American mission more nearly resembles the classic embassy with limited tasks. In Korea our involvement is recent but very deep and the American establishment includes sizable American forces and military bases as well as a host of civilian agencies. Except for the Communist bloc and a few small posts where our responsibilities are limited, the number of agencies and operating programs demands on-the-spot coordination and central supervision, lest inter-agency pulling and hauling dissipate American influence. To meet this need Washington has turned to the Ambassador. whose authority is reinforced by his Presidential appointment and diplomatic precedence. Gradually, if unevenly, since World War II, the Truman, Eisenhower, and especially the Kennedy Administrations have tried to build the Ambassador's coordinating role into our tradition and get it accepted in the day-to-day operations of government agencies. But Washington giveth and Washington taketh away. In theory, the Ambassador is now more than primus inter pares. He is the active leader and director of American policies and programs. But practice often falls short, not least because Washington frequently undercuts the leadership and direction it asks him to provide. In principle, our modern Chiefs of Mission are, like the President they serve, chief executives of large complex establishments, and as their other roles have changed-sometimes diminishing-this new executive role has come to the fore. The result may be called the Ambassador's dilemma. One: He is expected to perform his traditional diplomatic functions in a most untraditional setting, with less independence and less policy authority than Ambassadors once exercised-and with far more people under foot; Two: He is expected to contribute to the policy process from the perspective of a single-country mission, while those at home who have to make the policies treat almost nothing as a single-country problem; Three: He is expected to serve as leader and coordinator of his "country team" while lacking power or even much influence over the budgets, the personnel systems, the reporting requirements, and the operating policies of many of the field staffs theoretically subordinate to him. His dilemma places a great burden on an Ambassador and ways must be found to improve and increase the support Washington gives him. II. The President and the Ambassador I have made choice of [John Doe], a distinguished citizen of the United States, to reside near the Government of Your Excellency in the quality of Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America. He is well informed of the relative interests of the two countries and of the sincere desire of this Government to cultivate to the fullest extent the friendship which has so long subsisted between them. My knowledge of his high character and ability gives me entire confidence that he will constantly endeavor to advance the interests and prosperity of both Governments and so render himself acceptable to Your Excellency. President Lyndon B. Johnson, Letter of Credence of an Ambassador to a Chief of State, 1964 An Ambassador is the personal representative of our Chief of State and Government to the Chief of State to whom he is accredited. In fact, however, most Ambassadors have only a remote relation to a President himself and are not recognized as members of his intimate official family. The very multitude of Ambassadors is one of the problems. Since 1960 the number of Chiefs of Mission to other governments has burgeoned over the one hundred mark, and this is too many for any President to know well. A Chief of Mission customarily works in the framework of the State Department; he reports to the Department; his salary and administrative support come from the Department. The source of his instructions is normally the Secretary of State, acting for the President, 52-721 0-655 or, in appropriate cases, an Assistant Secretary of State, acting for the Secretary. This is as it should be. But, in practice, an Ambassador needs status as the President's man. Present and former Ambassadors emphasized in testimony to the Subcommittee that a chief asset an Ambassador can bring to his job is the reputation for having the special confidence and trust of the President. When an Ambassador overseas negotiates, or speaks in private or in public, his audience needs to feel that he has the confidence and speaks with the authority of the President of the United States. It is to the advantage of a President himself to have direct knowledge of his Chiefs of Mission. Under Secretary of State Averell Harriman made this comment to the Subcommittee: The more Ambassadors that the President knows personally and has confidence in, the easier it is for him to act on the advice which comes from that embassy. More Presidential directives stating that the Ambassador is the personal representative of the President are not likely to help. Whatever can be done in this regard by Presidential letter or order has already been accomplished by the successive efforts of the last three Presidents. It is an advantage, of course, when a President has known some of his appointees at an earlier time. But no President is likely to be widely acquainted with members of the Foreign Service, especially with those at the deputy chief of mission (DCM) level who ought to be the main source of candidates. In these circumstances, the Department of State should make a special effort to bring promising career candidates to the personal attention of a President. Fortunately, in our time, good men do not lack occasions to distinguish themselves, to become known to a President, and to win his respect. Beyond that, the Department of State, the White House, and an ambassadorial appointee should cooperate to make the relationship of President and Ambassador more than routine. Hopefully, a President will come to know his key Chiefs of Mission at least as well as he does his top Washington officials and chief military leaders. III. The Modern Ambassador: Diplomat Confidentially, and you must not betray my radical statement, it is a crime the way the higher staffs submerge the staffs and units below them with detailed instructions, endless paper reports and other indications of unfamiliarities with troop doings. I have come almost to feel that my principal duty as a Commander is to be out with the troops protecting them against my own staff *** I have gotten to the point where the sight of paper inflames me. Brigadier General George C. Marshall, Letter to Major Paul E. · Peabody, April 6, 1937 The modern Ambassador plies his diplomatic trade with less autonomy than in earlier days. But he is still the spearhead of American influence abroad. A President and a Secretary of State, in setting and maintaining our national course, are heavily dependent upon him for advice and help. And no quantity of messages and visitors from Washington can take the place of an Ambassador's personal judgment and effectiveness in the field situation. There are many ways in which Washington could fortify our Ambassadors in the exercise of their diplomatic responsibilities: A clear signal on national policies from Washington.-An Ambassador cannot be effective if he is kept guessing about the policies of the administration he serves. And national policy begins at home. A scarcity of documents is not the problem, they superaboundState Department Guidelines, Internal Defense Plans, Long-Range Assistance Studies, AID Program Books, USIS Country Plans, Military Assistance Five-Year Plans, and for some countries, National Policy Papers (NPP). The underlying difficulty is found elsewhere. It consists in the frequent failure of Washington to provide a timely, coherent, approved policy line and to give the reasoning behind its action-and inaction. Ambiguity of policy is bound to result in missed opportunities to protect our position in situations abroad. It encourages those who do not have responsibility to jump across lines and get into the act, often, in the process, making a bad situation worse. It means that Washington speaks with too many-and conflicting— voices. This has been so under every administration. A strong rear echelon at headquarters.-One recurrent complaint of American Ambassadors is that Washington takes too much time in replying to communications from the field. The way to combat this blight is to provide an Ambassador with a strong working counterpart in the State Department who can overcome bureaucratic procedure, get things done fast in the Department and with other agencies, and reply to the Ambassador-if necessary within a few hours. Yet an Ambassador's usual counterpart in Washington-the Country Desk Officer-may not have real authority to staff out an issue, even within the State Department, and, beyond that, he is seldom the equal of the Ambassador in experience and judgAs Ambassador Foy D. Kohler told the Subcommittee: ment. I personally have a great deal of sympathy for the idea that Secretary Rusk put forward, here, that the level of backup of the embassies abroad ought to be raised, supplemented, so that you in fact have a kind of duplicate of our mission here, backing us up. A loosening of Washington's apron-strings. All too often an experienced envoy in the field is second-guessed by a junior official in Washington who is less qualified to judge either the issue or the tactics. Within the limits of general guidance and instructions, an Ambassador should have broad discretion as to the timing, form, and level of approach to the government to which he is accredited. It is plain, however, that Washington "overinstructs" its Ambassadors. In part, to be sure, this may be the fault of an Ambassador. As retired Ambassador and former Deputy Under Secretary of State H. Freeman Matthews told the Subcommittee: I made it a practice never to seek instructions unless I was either in doubt as to policy or felt that the weighty reinforcement of Washington instructions would enhance the chances of success in obtaining our objectives. * * * I have felt that too often Ambassadors have shown too much caution or timidity, usually those with lesser experience or It is obvious that an Ambassador's first job is to carry out his instructions. The problem is to find a balance between the extremes of overinstruction, on the one hand, and freewheeling, on the other. On many occasions, an Ambassador can usefully indicate to Washington that he intends to act in a certain way by a certain date, unless otherwise directed-a practice known in the Navy's book as "UNODIR." A curb rein on special Washington emissaries.-There appears to be a belief in Washington that some alchemy of jet travel will convert indecisiveness in Washington to decisiveness in the field. It would be better on many occasions for Washington to make up its mind and to issue appropriate instructions to its Ambassador. The special negotiator has a role when highly technical issues must be worked out or when a matter arises of great sensitivity or difficulty, requiring the presence of someone clearly outranking the Ambassador and, most important, closely associated with the President's current thinking. But the practice of commuter-trips by special emissaries is now clearly overdone, and a serious consequence is to erode the prestige and authority of an Ambassador in the eyes of the local government. Discouragement of back-door approaches to Washington.-Sometimes when a foreign government has taken a matter up with the American Ambassador without receiving satisfaction, it has used its Washington embassy to press its claim. And worse, the maneuver has sometimes worked. It goes without saying that the authority of our Ambassador is not enhanced in the process. If Washington decides that a concession should after all be made, our Ambassador should normally be permitted to take the matter up again in his own way and to use the occasion to strengthen his own position in the eyes of the local government as a person of influence in his government. A related point was mentioned to the Subcommittee by retired Ambassador Ellis O. Briggs: I have detected across the years a tendency on the part of the Department of State to call in the foreign ambassador and give him good news to convey to his government, but to instruct the American Ambassador in the field to break the bad news to the foreign government. I have had it happen to me time and again. A clamp-down on the open mouth policy.-The tendency of touring juniors to talk is a perennial problem. An official who would be scarcely visible in a group photograph of the Washington hierarchy and who could not attract an audience anywhere in the United States on the basis of his own reputation is understandably flattered to find attentive audiences abroad, where, unlike the United States, there may be a correlation between the length of a man's title and his importance. The resulting clutter of speeches is, as Ambassador David Bruce told the Subcoinmittee, "sometimes extremely disruptive." Ordinarily-visits of the President or the Secretary of State and a handful of other officials apart an Ambassador, not a troupe of |