FOREIGN RELATIONS: Five-Star Diplomat

(See Cover)

Weary-eyed, a little rumpled and sniffling from a cold caught somewhere between Athens and Rome, U.S. Deputy Under Secretary of State Robert Daniel Murphy eased his 6 ft. 2 in. gratefully into a seat in Columbine III. Turning to his traveling companion, Murphy began talking quietly, steadily of the historic trip just ending; rushed to the Middle East 29 days before, Murphy had traveled 18,575 miles, visited nine Middle East and European nations, in Lebanon alone met 45 times with government and rebel leaders. When Diplomat Murphy finished talking, his friend on the Columbine leaned toward him. "Bob," said the President of the U.S., returning to Washington after his United Nations speech, "you did a wonderful job."

Five-Star Ambassador* Bob Murphy, 63, had indeed done a remarkable job. Among his major achievements: 1) by urging a positive, performance-over-propaganda U.S. program for the Middle East, he contributed directly to the policies set forth in the President's U.N. speech; 2) by rallying rival Lebanese parties behind compromise President-elect Fuad Chehab, he arranged a shaky sort of cease-fire and brought a promise of political order to Lebanon; 3) he shrewdly impressed Arab leaders, both friendly and hostile, with the key fact that the U.S. had shown itself able and willing to help its friends in the Middle East—while the U.S.S.R., for all its ballistic-blackmail diplomacy, had backed off when the going got rough.

Behind those achievements lay nearly 40 years of international troubleshooting.

Murphy has been on hand wherever and whenever the flames of world controversy burned hottest: in Munich during Hitler's brawling beer-hall days, in North Africa patiently maneuvering to deliver Vichy France's colonies to the World War II Allies, in Berlin during the airlift, in Trieste and at Panmunjom, in London during the Suez crisis. To Tunisians he is "Monsieur Bans Offices," to austere Britons he is "Breezy Bob," and to Pravda he is "Warmonger Murphy." To friends and enemies alike, he is perhaps the world's fastest-moving, most highly skilled diplomatic fireman.

From Warm to Cold. Murphy's fire-fighting talents come from the diplomatic professionalism that has made him senior careerman of all the 12,585 State Department and Foreign Service professionals spread round the world in 77 embassies, three legations, 199 consulates and other outposts. Murphy knows the diplomatic rule book as well as anyone alive—and his professionalism tells him the proper time to throw it away. He can be a charming, top-hatted and white-gloved diplomat—or a deadly antagonist. Says an admiring British Commonwealth diplomat: "He is a joy to behold in action. I have never seen any man who could sit at a conference table and smile and nod and rub his hands—and, when the occasion demands, be so coldly vicious." Thus, in Lebanon last fortnight, when Nasserite Rebel Leader Saeb Salam threatened to pitch U.S. marines into the sea, Murphy's eyes turned hard, and he began cracking his knuckles like a machine gun. Said he: "You know, Mr. Salam, we have the power to destroy your positions in a matter of seconds." Then, softly: "We haven't used it. We hope we don't have to."