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of executive responsibility and administration; namely, that every executive, and notably every President, has a highly personal style and that he should be accorded wide flexibility in translating it into administrative arrangements. Each of the three Presidents during the period of protracted international crisis has organized the key security institutions of the Executive Branch in a different way, establishing distinctive relations with his personal advisers, his Cabinet, the ranking military leaders, etc. Whatever views one may hold as to the relative efficacy of Roosevelt, Truman, and Eisenhower in the Office of the President, it is clear that they and their successors required and deserve great latitude in orchestrating the institutions of the Executive Branch to their policy and purpose.

On the other hand, the President's administrative decisions should be made within a framework of open surveillance of the workings of the Executive Branch and of disinterested professional advice. To these ends SubPanel VI recommends that permanent machinery for review of Executive Branch organization exist in the Congress (as well as in the Executive Branch) and that periodic reports be made to the Congress through the Government Operations Committees; and, further, that major studies of government organization be undertaken by outside committees at intervals of some years (say, six).

Subpanel VI gave special attention to one concrete problem of Presidential administration and leadership which has developed in the post-war years and shows no signs of abating; namely, the organization under the

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President of staff work and administration of foreign affairs. Looked at from the point of view of the national interest and performance, we have already presented the view that staff elements need increased strength and independence within the security institutions of the Executive Branch. Looked at from the perspective of the President, the problem posed by the new scale and complexity of American military and foreign policy may be described in terms of two questions:

- How can the quasi-consstitutional primacy of the Secretary of State, as the President's first adviser in foreign affairs, be maintained at a time when the protection of the national interest requires the participation and operation of many branches of the government, including a substantial military component even in times of peace ?

- Whatever the system of organization adopted for co-ordinating policy and operations in the field of military and foreign policy how can the President insure that the key issues requiring his attention and decision are brought to him in time; that they are well defined; that the widest range of alternative solutions are developed and presented for his choice; and that his decisions are, in fact, translated into day-to-day operation by the bureaucracies chiefly concerned ?

Subpanel VI is clear that no organizational solution will wholly resolve these dilemmas: and that the optimum solution will vary to an important degree with the personality and operating style of each President.

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Against this background of reserve and flexibility we are, nevertheless, prepared to make two broad recommendations. First, the size, quality, and independence of the staff of the National Security Council should be increased; and the authority of the post now held by the Presidential Assistant for National Security Affairs be recognized and confirmed. Whatever the President's tastes and choices are in administration, the many-faceted character of the nation's current and foreseeable problems require that the President have available to him staff work done independently of the operational vested interests of particular departments; and that this work be directed and its results articulated by a strong independent figure in the President's councils.

Second, the President must be prepared to conduct an endless struggle to ensure that the problems and analyses brought to him have not been pre-compromised in such ways as to conceal the real issues and choices faced by the nation; and that his decisions are not sabotaged by the passive resistance at which all bureaucracies are expert. To a degree the President must make a choice between injecting himself directly and personally in major issues of policy-making and their execution (at some cost to his role as unifying symbol in the government as well as the country) or going along with whatever his operating subordinates can negotiate among themselves by way of agreement (at some cost to the pace of innovation, and unity of impact of national policy). Without prescribing any particular formulae, and recognizing that this choice is a matter of degree, Subpanel VI holds the view that the President should lean to the first rather than second choice of method at a time of

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chronic international crisis, when American policy must move sensitively if
the nation's interests are to be protected. Despite the scale of the organiza-
tion he must command and the intricacy of the problems on which he must make
decision, the President and his Office remain and must remain a highly
personal affair. Every device within the wit of man capable of easing his task
should be explored and installed if judged helpful; but we should never cherish
the illusion that the essential functions of the President can safely be
institutionalized in inter-departmental committees or delegated to other men.

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PART III:
LEADERSHIP AND RESPONSIBLE TWO-WAY COMMUNICATION

Introduction

The process of leadership is, evidently, capable of improvement at
many points in the Executive Branch and the Congress; but the most fundamental
problem for a democracy whose survival requires an expensive, active, and
rapidly changing military and foreign policy lies in the general area of what is
usually called public opinion. The classic weaknesses of democracy in con-
ducting foreign affairs are familiar enough: a lack of popular interest; an
unwillingness to make sacrifice until acute and dangerous crises arise; ignor-
ance of the outside world and a rigidly nationalistic approach to it; a tendency
towards waves of emotional response to external events; and so forth. The
reasons for these classic weaknesses are equally familiar: the absorption of
energy, attention, and ambition in peaceful domestic pursuits; a lack of well-
balanced experience and knowledge of the world outside; an instinctive suspi-
cion of specialists in foreign affairs; and, in the case of the United States,
powerful residues of our isolationist heritage.

However much one believes these classic weaknesses and forces still
characterize American public opinion in military and foreign policy, the fact
must be faced that in our democracy taxes can not be raised and men can not
be called into the armed forces without a popular assent which transcends a

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mere majority vote in the Congress. Although military and foreign affairs can, for a time, be conducted as an insider's operation, in the end the public weight will be felt; and it is to the common interest that this inevitable influence be as intelligent and effective as our powers of mutual education permit. And in this connection there is a second fact to be recognized. In the past twenty years the American public has proved capable on a series of occasions short of all-out war, of giving understanding and support to measures of a subtlety (for example, Lend-Lease, the Marshall Plan, N.A.T.O., long-term foreign aid) which belies the simple image of democratic public opinion passed down to us from Tocqueville and Bryce to be confirmed in our time by Lippmann and Kennan.

In one sense the problem of strengthening the relations between our formal political leadership and the public can be described as the problem of institutionalizing -- as a steady part of the national scene and performance -- what we, in this generation, have come to do quite well at moments of acute crisis in foreign relations.

It is on the potentialities revealed by the nation in these recent crises that Subpanel VI's recommendations in regard to public opinion are substantially built.

## The Lesson of Crises Surmounted

The essence of what was done on occasions such as the Lend-Lease or Marshall Plan debates lay in a widespread sharing of responsibility for the

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nation's decision: the President and the Executive Branch responsibly laid be-
fore the public the problem the nation confronted, the facts bearing upon it,
and the choices that appeared open to us; the President personally committed
himself concerning the broad direction in which a solution was to be found; the
Congress held extensive hearings, permitting all manner of opinion to be
expressed, fixing public attention on the problem in hand over a considerable
period; finally, the extraordinary sub-structure of private associations which
characterize American life was galvanized into taking positions. Out of this
complex, apparently disorderly process -- wholly different from the image of
a single wise leader charting his course, and an obedient public following
along -- three things happened: first, a responsible view of the problem was
presented to the public, with the President himself vouching for its urgency
and the general character of the decision required of the nation; second, a
wide range of representative and trusted communal and group leaders did their
homework and said their piece -- not merely Congressmen, but business,
labor, and farm leaders, churchmen, professors, etc.; third, a public, informed
to the limit of its absorptive capacity, with every opportunity for communication
open, evidently reached a majority consensus, and its assent was registered
by a Congress, which had been hard at work on its own, but with a sharp eye
for grass-roots conclusions.

The lesson to be learned from these successful exercises is that when
the political process is widened out from the Executive Branch and the Congress

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and the public is brought into the arena of decision -- notably through those men and women who lead the voluntary associations -- the capacity of the nation to act boldly and strongly in foreign affairs has been increased, not diminished. The public needs, of course, to be responsibly informed on major issues of military and foreign policy as they arise; but political leaders need equally to be reminded of the intelligence and of the capacity for action and sacrifice of the American electorate when it is brought into position of a responsibility.

## Some Complexities in Public Opinion

This relatively optimistic conclusion is based not merely on the recent record of public performance at its best, but also on certain substantive views about the character of public opinion in relation to military and foreign policy. Public opinion in military and foreign affairs is often discussed in one of two ways: as if it were an inflexible undifferentiated mass phenomenon, outside rational guidance; or as a phenomenon easily manipulated by experts in mass communications. In fact, American public opinion in military and foreign affairs is a complex phenomenon, in which the influence of the following specific factors must be taken into account.

### 1. The President's Capital

In one sense there is no clear-cut public opinion in military and foreign affairs until the President has taken his position. The

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President is endowed with a considerable capital fund; that is, the American public is inclined to give him a considerable latitude and to be influenced significantly by his assessment of external events and their meaning for the national interest. This latitude varies with many factors: it was, for example, great for President Truman at the outbreak of the Korean War, much narrowed by, say, the end of 1951. Nevertheless, while the American public is not inclined to follow blindly the President's lead, his view is a powerful element in the equation which determines public opinion. The President's role can, even, operate negatively: the press, the experts, and, even, Congress can become quite exercised about a military or foreign policy problem; but if the President chooses to remain passive action is unlikely, unless a crisis as flagrant as the Fall of France, Pearl Harbor, the attack on Korea, or Suez occurs. To a significant if limited extent, then, public opinion in military and foreign affairs is a function of what the President wishes it to be.

## 2. The 60-25-15 Split

On the other hand American public opinion is not a *tabula rasa*. The President faces a public whose general attitude is strongly affected by recent memories. Out of the experience of this generation -- involving the bankruptcy of inter-war isolationism, the Second World War and, then, the protracted struggle against international

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Communism, -- a rather shapely and recurrent pattern of public attitude towards international affairs has emerged. Broadly speaking, one can expect about 60% of the American public to take what might be called an "internationalist" position; about 25%, an "isolationist" position; and about 15% "don't know". These figures vary, of course, from issue to issue; but something like this breakdown in basic attitude appears to exist, increasingly independent of party allegiance and, even, of region. This does not mean that 60% of Americans wish actively to become more involved in the world and its affairs. On the contrary, there is ample evidence that Americans remain reluctant in assuming international responsibility. What these recurrent poll figures do demonstrate is that a substantial majority of Americans will support military and foreign policy measures when they become convinced that they are absolutely necessary for the maintenance of the nation's world position; and a substantial majority will shy away from positions they believe associated with an isolationist retreat or an abandoning of major alliances.

3. The Spectrum of Knowledge, Concern, and Confidence

Within the 85% or so prepared in most polls to express a view on military or foreign affairs there is, of course, a spectrum of knowledgeability, of seriousness of interest, and of confidence of

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judgment. Some portion of the American public is truly and regularly unconcerned with military and foreign affairs: ignorant, unconcerned, apathetic. But at a time when young men are subject to draft and taxes are as high as they are in support of the nation's security policy the number of persons truly apathetic about military and foreign policy is smaller than some analyses might lead one to believe. In Presidential primaries and elections of recent years it is clear, for example, that the public may not have made its choice in terms of specific military and foreign policy issues -- lacking confidence in its information and judgment -- but it made an overall assessment of the candidates in relation to their believed competence in these areas; and these over-all assessments were very powerful indeed in determining the outcome. Beyond a widespread public concern with the nation's external position -- perhaps, simply, a chronic uneasiness -- there are varying degrees of knowledgeability and, especially, of confidence of judgment within the American public. In domestic affairs the average citizen sees the impact of national policy in terms of the familiar round of his life. He not only knows the essential facts, he also sees what they mean in terms of situations and values with which he is at home. In military and foreign affairs the citizen -- even the interested and knowledgeable citizen -- can only rarely feel confident that

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he has a sufficient grasp of the situation to make a responsible
assessment. He remains an outsider in these important and
expensive matters, an observer of the Washington insider, even
if his newspapers and magazines, his radio and TV programs are
full of pieces of possibly relevant information and opinion. Under
these circumstances, short of a major crisis, or short of some
special effort in which the President makes an effort to focus
his attention, the typical American citizen will read his paper,
listen to the news, absorbing more or less information as his
background, taste, and intelligence dictate, but remain an
essentially passive figure -- friendly, suspicious, hostile or
neutral, in his attitude towards current policy -- but lacking a
sense of involvement or of personal responsibility.

To this static portrait an important dynamic element must
be added: the average level of education. Interest, knowledge,
and concern with foreign policy are positively correlated with
schooling; and the average level of education is under a powerful
trend rise in the United States. One can, then, anticipate with
confidence a progressively more knowledgeable and responsive
public in international affairs.

4. <u>Three Special Groups</u>

In addition to the citizen whose information is derived essentially
from the mass media there are three small special groups within

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the American public who can play a special role in the formation
of public opinion on specific issues of military and foreign policy:
the outside expert: the semi-professional; and the leader of volun-
tary associations. The expert in military and foreign affairs out-
side the government is probably a less powerful influence on the
general public than he would like to believe he is; or, put another
way, his power is mainly exercised by catching the attention or
influencing the thought of those with direct political responsibility
and power rather than in influencing public opinion at large. The
expert columnist or author in the field of military or international
affairs has, on the whole, a small audience, the most important
elements of which may prove to be members of the Executive Branch
or the Congress. He may, however, have significant impact on
a second special group: the semi-professional. Every substantial
community in contemporary America contains a small group of
citizens -- usually men and women otherwise distinguished by
their competence and sense of civic responsibility -- who maintain
an active interest in international affairs and who are, on the
whole, exceedingly well-informed. These people participate in
the regional Councils on Foreign Relations, lead the work in the
Foreign Policy Associations and the relevant committees of the
League of Women Voters, write the surprisingly thoughtful and

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mature editorials to be found in newspapers from coast to coast,
speak the wise Sunday sermon on international affairs, teach the
foreign policy courses in colleges and high schools, and so on.
Then, finally, there is the group of responsible leaders of busi-
ness, labor, farm, religious and other groups, who do not speci-
ize in international affairs, but who are prepared, when occas-
ion demands, to do their homework and to take public positions.
This group is exceedingly important in achieving a national con-
sensus; for its members often stand closer to the individual citi-
zen and his interests than elected officials. Their responsible
assent in measures of military and foreign policy is a two-way
signal of some power. It is an important reassurance to their
special constituents that the measure is, in fact, necessary for
the common good; and it is a message to the Executive and the
Congressional branches that public support is likely, when the
issue is clearly explained, and that it is politically safe to pro-
ceed.

There are two general observations to be made about these
special groups within the American public:

- Because of special knowledge, experience, or judgment they
can not be persuaded to support a line of public policy

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unless the case is fully, honestly, and persuasively made.
Neither as individuals nor as special groups are they in any
one's pocket.

-Increasingly the members of these special groups are get-
ting to know one another. One facet of the rapid evolution
of an American community is that leaders in special seg-
ments of national life are being brought together to consider
major problems, foreign and domestic. Businessmen and
professors, labor leaders and churchmen, farm organization
executives and foundation officials gather now as a matter
of course from every part of the country on one occasion or
another. The American Assembly is a symbol as well as an
important part of the substance of a powerful trend. As a
result, there now exists as never before the physical and
human possibility of thrashing out rapidly a nation-wide
consensus among those outside the government who can
play important roles in leading the community towards
agreement and action in military and foreign affairs.

American public opinion in military and foreign policy reflects, then, attitudes ranging from a minority's apathy to a majority's continuing concern; it is broadly committed to uphold the nation's world position of power and

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responsibility; it is prepared to respond to the President's lead and accord him
important degrees of flexibility, notably when his case is well made and presen-
ted with conviction; it has available a vast and regular flow of information, but
only a small proportion of the public feel sufficient confidence in what they
know to take firm positions on specific issues, without further guidance; the
public looks for guidance not only to the President and to other political leaders
but also to trusted local communal leaders, to the leaders of voluntary associ-
ations with whom they are connected.

## Some Proposals

If this assessment is roughly correct what steps might be taken which
would yield a more regular sense of public commitment and responsibility in
military and foreign affairs and permit the nation to pursue a more forehanded
policy, more likely to cope with problems before they develop into dangerous
crises? How, in short, can the grass roots democratic process be made to
work better in the fields of military and foreign affairs?

Subpanel VI, after reviewing a considerable array of suggestions, would
propose the following:

1. The President should use more fully and regularly his unique power to focus public attention on major problems of military and foreign policy. This should be done not only when the Executive Branch wishes urgently to take fresh action, but also when major issues are evidently just over the horizon. The

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President should be prepared to focus attention and to stimulate public discussion even before he and the Executive Branch as a whole have matured a clear policy position.

2. The Executive Branch should adopt and sustain in military as well as foreign affairs a policy of candor. Information should be denied the public on grounds other than aid or comfort to the enemy only under the most rare and special circumstances, if ever. The public must be trusted, and the natural tendency of Washington to underestimate the public's wisdom and good sense endlessly combatted.

3. As a special aspect of this policy the national budget should be presented to the Congress and to the country on a program basis, designed to make as clear as the real and bookkeeping complexities allow the cost of specific courses of action and policy.

4. Whenever possible issues should be presented to the public in the same terms as they are dealt with within the Executive Branch; that is, in the form of a tripartite statement of a factual situation, an array of alternative policies, and the case for the specific alternative chosen. A more effective public opinion requires not merely the availability of more authoritative information but also a sense of sharing in the choice of alternative courses of American action.

5. The President and the Executive Branch should actively encourage voluntary groups of all kinds to study specific major issues of military and foreign policy; to examine the policy choices open to the nation; and to make

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their recommendations. Work of this kind is already going forward in the Council on Foreign Relations, the Committee for Economic Development, the Foreign Policy Associations, The American Assembly, the League of Women Voters, etc. This work should be officially encouraged, notably by having factual material and speakers made available by the Executive Branch; by bringing selected leaders to Washington for extended briefing; etc. Under no circumstances however, should the relationship between the government and such groups be regarded as one of a channel for propaganda: the objective is the quite different one of inducing a widening range of Americans to share the experience of examining alternative policy positions on the basis of responsible information.

6. None of these proposals requires or justifies the setting up of a new government agency for the domestic supply of information or opinion.

7. Without commitment to a particular formula there was a general sense that both the government and the public might benefit from a continuous study of the nation's basic problems, privately financed, drawing into its work not only the most competent staff work available but also men and women of the widest experience and the highest wisdom, integrity, and public devotion.