Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1949-01-16
From Pinch-Hitter to Requ|ar
Had Responsibilities
But Not Authority
of Secretary

But Not Authority
of Secretary
the war for what they were, and one
of the flrst high officials to speak
out against them.
His attitude had grown skeptical
by the time he was called on by
Secretary Byrnes to address rally
sponsored by the National Council
of Soviet-American Friendship in
New York on November IL, 1915. He
remarked then that ito say that
there are overwhelming reasons why
we (the United States and RUSSIA
should be friends is not to say that
we are friends One of the sures't
foundations for friendship, he en-
phasized, is respect for the prin-
ciple of equal rights and self-deter-
mination of peoples''-an indirect
warning to Russia about her actions
in Eastern Europe.
BY mid June of 1947, Mr.. Acheson
had gone far beyond diplomatic
'indirectness in assailirg the Soviet
In bis last speech as Undersecretary
ne fatty accused the Russians OF
pursuing policies dramatically op-
posed to the very premises of inter-
national accord and recovery"
Drew Protest From Reds
A few morths previously, in Feb
.uary, 1947 he had made world news
by telling a congressional co.amiCtee
that he was quite aware OF the fact
that Russian foreign policy is an
aggressive and expanding one.
Those words sound meek now, but
they were the strongest used about
Russia by top American official up
to that time. They drew bitter
protest from Soviet Foreign Minister
Molotov, who called Mr.. AcheSon s
statement "rudely slanderous and
hostile to the Soviet Union" Secre-
tary Marshall rejected the protest
upholoing Mr.. Acheson's remark as
a restrained comment made lin
the line of duty
In the last few months of his serv-
ice as Undersecretary, Mr., Acheson
hoped to map out the Truman
doctrine" asserted in the Greek
Turkish aid program, and the Mar-
shall Plan for European recovery
He gave the first inkling of the
Marshall Plan in a speech at Cleve-
land, Miss, on May 8, l947-nearly
a full month before Gen. Marshall
proposed the cooperative recovery
program in more detail in his ia
nous speech at Harvard. Mr.
Acheson said at Cleveland that fur
Their economic aid to Europe was
going to be needed and that I'VE
are going to have to concentrate
our emergency assistance in areas
where it will be most effective in
building world political and eco
nomic stability, in promoting human
freedoms and democratic institu-
lions. =, ="
Mr.. Acheson's final speech as
Undersecretary, on June Is, 1947
summed up his ideas on American
policy this way:
1T is sensible and hard headed
principle that where our help can
be effective to enable people who
are sincerely striving to remain free
and to solve their own problems
that help will be given.
Part in Atomic Plan
I'VE should, and I hope will, con-
tinue to act in this way-not wait
ing for extreme crises to develop
not attempting to carry all the bur-
dens of the world on our shoulders
or to solve all its problems, but re-
spending in a. thoroughly realistic
way to the proposals of those who
are exhausting every possibility of
their own efforts and powers of CO.
operation with others to maintain
places where free men remain free
This, as I see it, has been the
course of our foreign policy over
these past few years. And 1t is our
present course. 1t has not created
the world of our dreams. But that
Is not our fault. 1t Is the best course
I know of, in the world as we find
1t, to preserve the possibility that
a better world may some day
eventuate."
Mr.. Acheson's name is linked
closely with several developments in
American policy preceding the Tru-
man doctrine and the Marshall
Plan, among them this Govern
ment's plan for international con-
troll of atomic energy. He played
a major role In formation of the
1916 Acheson-Lilienthal report en-
phasizing the necessity of effective
international control Of all atomic
resources before America could give
up its atomic secrets. This report
&C.. u0DNTD Do0o COL