FOREIGN RELATIONS: Broad-Picture Man

(5 of 6)

"The Amateur." Not all of Dulles' explanations had such happy consequences. In his overwhelming desire to get his policies understood he occasionally forgot that some things not only go without saying, but are better left unsaid. At a press conference (TIME, Sept. 14), he said that it would be a disaster if Konrad Adenauer did not win the West German elections. This statement came too late to affect the elections either way, but it was a bobble none the less. At the same time, Dulles strongly intimated that he did not feel bound to hold to the pro-Italian Trieste policy which the U.S. had adopted over five years ago when Yugoslavia was still a Soviet satellite. By publicly plugging Adenauer, Dulles laid himself wide open to the charge of meddling in West German affairs, a charge which might easily have created enough German resentment to cost Adenauer the election. The statement on Trieste caused universal outrage in Italy without making any visible improvement in U.S. relations with Yugoslavia.

Sincerity & Suspicion. Another criticism of Dulles is that his "intransigent" attitude toward the Soviet Union increases the danger of superbomb war. British Socialists and their new spiritual leader, Jawaharlal Nehru, wring their hands whenever Dulles makes a statement defining the struggle with Communism in moral and religious terms.

On this point, Dulles could not retreat, even if he wanted to. As a whole, the U.S. people make their basic political judgments on moral grounds. All U.S. leaders recognize this fact and describe the struggle with Communism in moral terms. There are two ways in which Dulles, on this point, differs from Truman and Acheson: 1) he is clearer about it, and 2) his practical policies reflect the greater clarity.

Dulles says: "Soviet Communism starts with an atheistic, Godless premise. Everything else flows from that." Communism explicitly denies an objective moral law as that is understood in the Jewish, Christian and Moslem religions. Dulles is convinced that the evil of Communism flows from this denial, and that the struggle against Communism will be lost if it is considered merely a contest between rival power blocs.

On the other hand, Dulles is humble enough to recognize, as he told the U.N. last month, that the U.S. has "no monopoly of wisdom or virtue." He is against starting a "holy war" to extirpate Communism. And he is fully aware that sound morals do not necessarily lead to wise policies. But he believes that where a nation holds a trusteeship against an organized, clearly recognizable evil, as the U.S. does, successful, realistic policy takes on a positive moral value.

This belief is exemplified by Dulles' action at the three levels of politics—morals, policy, operations. To the first, Dulles has contributed more clarity and force but has not essentially altered the U.S. line. His great contribution is at the middle level of specific policies. These are moral in the sense that they have a good end, not pursued by evil means. But such policies as Dulles pursued in Indo-China and Germany are not derived directly from moral principles but from facts of political reality in the world that exists.