Rio de Janeiro does not accord with his observations. We have been somewhat understaffed, rather than overstaffed, in Brazil during my tenure as Ambassador, not only in the State Department but also in the AID and information missions, and have at times suffered badly from the inability to man certain key spots. In general, improved quality is even more important than larger numbers, but I have not seen evidences of the kind of massive overstaffing suggested by Ambassador Briggs' testimony.

In Washington, on the other hand, I am persuaded that overstaffing does exist in large measure, and that Parkinson's law is well exemplified both in the Department of State and other agencies concerned with foreign affairs. This is, indeed, one cause of the tendency toward excessive centralization of foreign policy and operating decisions.

THE NEW DIPLOMACY

Implicit in what has been said above is the conviction that what is now commonly called "the new diplomacy" is here to stay for the foreseeable future. The first chapter of the Herter Committee's report provides a concise summary of the fundamental changes in international relations and U.S. responsibilities signified by that term. Some of the testimony before the subcommittee, vigorously critical of the size of our oversea establishment and the participation in it of officials responsible to agencies other than the Department of State, has in fact although not in express terms-been based on a rejection of all aspects of international relations other than the traditional bilateral negotiations between governments. Programs of economic aid, of military assistance and training, of information and cultural exchange, of scientific representation, and of multilateral regional and worldwide organization, have all been called into question.

Certainly the scope and adequacy of these operational and multilateral activities require constant review, both to eliminate activities which are no longer useful but merely reflect bureaucratic survival power, and to expand activities which are not geared up to the pressing needs of foreign policy. In my view, however, the basic validity of these newer instruments of foreign policy ought by now to be beyond argument. How best to organize and man these functions is indeed a serious question, and certainly the best solutions have not yet been found. But it does not advance the national interest to characterize oversea aid and information activities as "blowing soap bubbles."

To give only one example, one of the most marked developments in public attitudes in Latin America in recent decades is the growth of anti-American nationalism, heavily spiked with Marxist orientation. This has become a pervasive (and in many cases a dominant) element in the thinking of university professors and students, creative writers and artists, journalists, and other intellectual and professional groups. These views are generally accompanied by an extraordinary ignorance of the nature of contemporary American society.

The deliberate distortions and misrepresentations propagated by the small minorities who are Communist Party members are not surprising, but the spread of these distortions far beyond active Communist Party membership is deeply disturbing, especially in a region where we have hitherto taken for granted a broad community of out

look on liberal and democratic principles. While there are many reasons for the growth of these attitudes, some of them rooted in the socially backward conditions of many of the Latin American nations, a substantial share of them must be recognized as being the fruits of skillful Soviet activity of the "new diplomacy" type over several decades, and a reflection of the inadequacy of our own actions in the fields of information, education, and cultural exchange. There is still a long uphill road ahead of us in these fields.

NONCAREER AMBASSADORS

As a representative of the group of noncareer Ambassadors, it is with some diffidence that I comment on this topic. Like others who have testified to your committee, I believe in a strong career service. Such a service can attract and hold good men only if they have a legitimate expectation of coming to serve as chiefs of mission or Assistant Secretaries of State. With over 100 posts abroad, I would normally expect well over half of them to be headed by career officers.

I am not persuaded, however, that the interests of the United States would be served by reserving all of these posts to career officers. The exigencies of our oversea operations in today's world-and for the foreseeable future sometimes require experience and qualifications which occur only rarely among career officers. I have noted the distinction made by some of your witnesses between purely political appointments, based merely on contribution to political party finances, and semiprofessional appointments of men or women with broad experience in public service as well as in civilian life. Like the other witnesses, I am opposed to the former type of appointment, but see great merit in the latter. Taking at random the names of a baker's dozen of men out of personal acquaintance among present or recent Ambassadors, I would offer for your consideration Ambassadors John Badeau, Chester Bowles, David Bruce, Ellsworth Bunker, Charles Cole, James Conant, John Ferguson, Kenneth Galbraith, Averell Harriman, Walter Howe, Henry Labouisse, George McGhee, and Edwin Reischauer as examples of this semiprofessional category. To these male names I would add those of Mrs. Anderson and Mrs. Luce. All of them have served with distinction, and very much to the positive interest of the U.S. Government.

Even if we were recruiting into the Foreign Service the very best young men and women available, occasions would often arise when the particular needs of an Embassy in one or another country would suggest appointing to it someone with specialized background and skills not available within the Service. As a university professor with a fair range of experience in observing career choices by exceptionally able young persons, however, I must state candidly that while the Service is getting some very good ones, it is by no means always getting the best. Anyone familiar with the career choices of college seniors or postgraduates at the better universities, observing the choices among the classic professions, business, academic life, and the public service is aware of this fact. One reason for this difficulty is the simple bread-and-butter fact that the pay scales at the higher levels of Government service are no longer competitive with those of other occupations attractive to professional-type youngsters. The Herter Committee rightly stressed the importance of improving the quality of

recruitment, both at the junior level and through lateral entry at intermediate and higher levels.2

The basic guiding rule for the selection of Ambassadors, I believe, should be to find the most competent people for the jobs. As the quality of recruitment and career management in the Foreign Service are improved, career officers should in increasing proportion come to be the best qualified. In cases of close choice, I would give preference to the career man. I should be surprised, however, if 20 to 30 percent of the ambassadorial posts did not continue to be filled, under this criterion, by semiprofessional candidates.

Many competent career officers have emphasized to me the benefits which they themselves believe are brought to the career by the admixture of competent noncareer Ambassadors with a diversity of backgrounds and experience, and do not seem to resent their presence as unfair competition.

From the viewpoint of the noncareer Ambassador himself, there is the advantage of the greater sense of independence he feels through not having a vested interest in his own future within the career. If he carries this to the extreme of developing a policy of his own, at variance with the Government's policy, this independence can become counterproductive. But if he exercises it constructively to contribute to the formulation of policy jointly with his superiors in Washington, it may prove a real asset in the management of our foreign relations.

WASHINGTON COORDINATION AND DIRECTION

Although I have been asked to comment mainly on the questions of oversea operations and the role of the Ambassador, I should like to include a brief observation on the problems of coordination and direction in Washington. I am wholly in accord with your staff study observation that interagency relations in the field are relatively harmonious and free from the acute jurisdictional rivalry so evident in Washington. Such rivalry, indeed, is perhaps the single most serious obstacle to speed and clarity in decisionmaking.

The reasons for relative simplicity in the field are the small numbers of people involved, their close contact with common problems, and the fact of integrated direction by the Ambassador. Except for the existence of ultimate Presidential authority in Washington, these conditions cannot be reproduced there. As I have argued in previous writings, and as the subcommittee's staff studies have well pointed out, this problem cannot be resolved by the designation of a super Secre tary of Foreign Affairs or the gathering of all foreign relations into a single superdepartment. This is obvious in relation to military functions, and should be evident on only moderate reflection with respect to financial, commercial, agricultural, scientific, and other activities where domestic and foreign interests of the United States are bound to overlap. Hence the impossibility of applying in Washington the principle of integration, which is amply applicable abroad, and the need instead for truly effective coordination.

The final responsibility for coordination of policy within the executive branch rests with the President. It would be a serious error, how

"Personnel for the New Diplomacy," report of the Committee on Foreign Affairs Personnel, Dec. 1962, pp. 65-80.

ever, to depend mainly on the immediate Presidential staff or the Executive Office of the President to assist him in carrying out this vital function. Primary reliance for it should be placed squarely on the Secretary of State and his Department, reserving the Presidency for broad guidance and for resolving the irreducible minimum of interagency differences which the Department of State cannot handle, even with ample Presidential backing.

A large proportion of potential interagency friction can be forestalled by effective arrangements for interagency collaboration in the early stages of policymaking. If there is free interchange of people and ideas at lower levels, it is much less likely that agencies will develop rigid and antagonistic positions like sovereign states gathered at an international negotiating conference. In the relations between the State and the Defense Departments, there has been an immeasurable improvement since the dark days of 1949, mainly as a result of this practice. Training at the war colleges and elsewhere has given upper, middle, and senior level officers a better understanding of the mixed political-military-economic nature of many foreign policy decisions, and this has been reinforced by interchanges of personnel and by formal and informal interagency teams and committees at the working level.

Curiously enough, difficult jurisdictional friction has proved harder to avoid in the relationships between the Departments of State and Commerce, Treasury, Agriculture, and the various foreign aid agencies than in the State-Defense field where more friction might be expected as a result of traditional differences of outlook between civilian and military officials. It is especially paradoxical that such friction should have persisted in relation to foreign aid even after the International Cooperation Administration was placed nominally "within" the Department of State. In the last 2 years, the back-toback physical arrangement of country desks and regional offices between the regional bureaus and country desks of the Department of State and the Agency for International Development has already shown promising results. There is still much to be done, however, in improving the working methods for cooperation between the State Department and the other long-established Cabinet agencies with foreign as well as domestic economic interests.

Of great importance in this connection are the ground rules employed for the functioning of interagency committees. Except in highly technical fields, such as atomic energy or geological surveys, I believe that the State Department should provide the chairman for all interagency committees concerned with foreign policy and operating matters. The function of these chairmen should be not simply to seek a consensus at a lowest common denominator, but rather to listen to and lead the discussion of the matter in hand, taking full account of the views and special knowledge of other agency representatives, and then to come to a conclusion. The chairman should not necessarily have the positive concurrence of all the other committee members; all that is required is their willingness to accept his decision without appealing to a higher level. If there is appeal to a higher level, the same principle of State Department primacy should apply there, and so on up until the rare case is reached requiring Presidential decision.

This would imply greater initiative, greater responsibility, and greater willingness to make judgments than is now often the case with middle and upper middle level State Department officers. It is, however, the only way to provide interagency coordination without the stultifying effects of government by committee which Mr. Robert Lovett so cogently set forth in his testimony to the earlier subcommittee. And there is no better way of training future Ambassadors and Assistant Secretaries of State than having them learn by experience the painful process of decisionmaking. If they are unable to do it well at midcareer, subject of course to guidance by higher authority, they are not good prospects for making their way to the top of the career.

MISCELLANEOUS ISSUES

Let me conclude with brief comments on other specific points which have been discussed by the subcommittee with other witnesses.

FUSION OF MILITARY ELEMENTS IN EMBASSY

The suggestion that the MAAG and military attaché work might be combined under a single Defense Department representative would clearly be impracticable in a country such as Brazil. Here the MAAG is the U.S. element of a joint Brazil-United States military commission, with Brazilian and American officers working together in planning the military_assistance and training programs and overseeing their execution. The military attachés, on the other hand, have the normal functions of liaison with the military services of the country of assignment, as well as military advice to the Ambassador. These are quite different types of function. Their confusion would weaken the effectiveness of both and create serious difficulties in relations with the host government.

NATIONAL FOREIGN AFFAIRS COLLEGE

Like most of your other witnesses, I am strongly opposed to the creation of a Foreign Affairs Academy at the undergraduate level, based on the example of the three military academies. It is highly undesirable for the decision to seek a career in the Foreign Service to be pushed back to the high school level, and it would be most difficult to judge the qualities of applicants at that stage. Drawing the junior recruits of the Service from the whole range of American colleges and universities, and from many graduate schools as well, provides a far broader base and much better prospects of highly qualified entrants into the career.

Even at the graduate level, I am not persuaded that a foreign affairs college would make a positive contribution to national needs. In its chapter on this subject (pp. 105 to 111), the Herter Committee lists certain advanced training responsibilities which it believes should be carried on by existing universities, and others which might best be performed by a new national foreign affairs college. In my view, the latter group could readily be handled by improvements in the present operations of the Foreign Service Institute. As the Herter Committee itself says, able men to staff such a new college are in short supply.