Washington Star, Jan. 1970

SOFT SPEECH, KNOWLEDGE—AND FIRMNESS

# Rogers Ends His Trial Period an Effective Secretary

By GEORGE SHERMAN
Star Staff Writer

He greeted the astonished Soviet ambassador at their third meeting with "Hi Anatoly!"

He cut off the disgruntled Israeli ambassador with "I got it the first time" when the persistent Yitzhak Ra-bin sought to grind over old ground on the Middle East.

He was the only speaker to get a standing ovation at the President's cere-monial Christmas Cabinet meeting, after tenderly expounding the Nixon version of Teddy Roosevelt's "Speak softly but carry a big stick."

He is William P. Rogers, amiable but hard-nosed, soft-spoken but brutally realistic, who—to the surprise of almost everyone except his friend, the Presi-dent—has turned into a powerful and effective secretary of state.

On the anniversary of his first year in an office he only reluctantly accept-ed, Bill Rogers—the "Bill" fits his infor-mality—admits to being enormously happy.

"I think I can make a mark in this job," he said in an interview.

"The achievement I seek is moving step by step toward a peace which at the same time provides for national security of the United States."

It is a view well suited to the man

whom Nixon said he chose as the "best negotiator" possible in the world. In the year since, Rogers has shown that he intends also to be an architect—not only

chief negotiator—of that "era of nego-tiation" Nixon proclaimed.

But it has taken Rogers that year to convince the doubters. He came to the

-United Press International

Secretary Rogers answers a question.

State Department with all the attributes of a professional diplomat except the key one—knowledge.

Wealthy and successful, the secretary had charm, sophisticated taste, im-peccable manners, the analytic talents of a first-class lawyer—but no more experience in world affairs than passing membership in the U.S. delegation to the United Nations.

TO MAKE MATTERS WORSE, Rogers had to fight the "Kissinger syn-drome" — a favorite topic of Washing-ton conversation from the moment Hen-ry A. Kissinger entered the White House as Nixon's key national security advis-er. The dynamic professor from Har-vard, well schooled in international af-fairs, got off to a swift start by recruit-ing some of the top State Department officers for his staff.

Both Rogers and Kissinger vehe-mently deny any rivalry. Both assert they have gotten on well together from the beginning. No evidence to the con-trary has surfaced.

But no one denies that the difference in the images they projected was a serious morale factor in the State De-partment for the first six months of Rogers' tenure.

"For the first half year Rogers was

Continued on Page A-4, Col. 1

ROGERS

Effective Secretary After a Year

*Continued From Page A-1*

all but invisible, as far as his impact on the building goes," said one of those "Young Turk" Foreign Service officers looking for change. "Nothing in the structure changed. During those first months, in terms of morale and management, Undersecretary Elliot Richardson made a much, much deeper impact."

But the Rogers technique paid off. He is quiet. He is undramatic. He hates the flashy, and has no flair for language. But he was learning. And today, 105,000 miles of travel and 100 meetings with foreign ministers later, even the critics agree that Rogers projects an aura of command in handling American foreign policy.

Lieutenants say the change was first perceptible in October after his return from two exhausting weeks of private meetings with some 85 foreign ministers at the United Nations General Assembly.

At those sessions he dug deep into the stuff of foreign affairs, making decisions from re-establishing diplomatic relations with the Arab state of Mauritania in West Africa to working out a mechanism for Middle East negotiations with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko.

HE CAME BACK with a thousand facts which his lawyer's memory will not forget. Those around him say he began to need less detailed briefings from long time experts.

There is a story that at one of his Monday-morning meetings with assistant secretaries of state, Aogers told his staff he realized he had been on trial— now it would be their turn!

From Rogers, the remark was not offensive. Those who work with him insist that he is tough, not mean. He has a good-natured way of putting uncomfortable remarks across.

"The man's life is filled with laughter," said one close subordinate of Roger's infectious chuckle.

"But he does not suffer fools lightly," said another, recalling the probing incisiveness of Rogers' conversation.

The veneer of charm serves well the cool-headed executive underneath. His technique for terminating long-winded talks and turning out unwanted callers is the envy of the top floor of the State Department:

When a pause comes in the conversation, he gets ups, shoots out his right hand and smiles. The victim is out the door with a flattering thank-you-for-stopping-by before he knows what has happened.

During the early months of the administration a garrulous older ambassador came by for "a chat." Three previous secretaries of state had never been able to spend less than one hour at a time with him. The office waited for Rogers' timing. He set a new record—20 minutes!

More recently a rare American visitor to Hanoi came by for an appointment, claiming that he had a message from the North Vietnamese that could only be delivered to the secretary of state. Rogers saw him, but no message existed. The visitor was out in 7 minutes—with no feelings hurt on either side.

ROGERS ADMITS to marshaling his time and energy. He is working longer hours than he expected—from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m.

He also is having a hard time sticking to his general rule of only one big social dinner a week.

But unlike his predecessor, Dean Rusk, who was absorbed with detail, obsessed with the Vietnam war and never took time off, Rogers puts a premium on relaxation.

In the season he tries to play golf at least once every weekend at Burning Tree Club. He also swims in the heated outdoor swimming pool in the backyard of the home he and his wife, Adele, own on the outskirts of Edgemoor in Bethesda.

He eats carefully and drinks sparingly. He has not gained any weight in office.

"After all, this is a hard job," said Rogers, "and anyone does his best work when he is not physically exhausted. There is also a limit to how much detail any one man can absorb."

This style accounts for his immense impact on the Nixon administration. Relaxation and self-confidence go hand-in-hand, in accord with the Nixon passion for a "low profile" in the world and the Rogers conviction that, where so much power exists, the United States need not talk loudly to achieve its aims.

The personal link between the two men is stronger than ever. It defies all the charts of organization paraded out to prove the corporate efficiency of the Nixonized National Security Council machinery. The power of long-standing friendship is summed up quite simply.

"To Bill Rogers—with deep appreciation for his loyal friendship and wise counsel through the years," signed "Dick Nixon," is the inscription on the picture of the President on Rogers' red-wood pannelled office wall.

THE CLOSEST ROGERS comes to visible irritation is over press talk of rivalry between him and Kissinger for the President's ear.

"Mr. Kissinger and I get along well and have from the beginning," he said. "He is conscious of our role and we are well aware of the need for the National Security Council machinery under him. In a government this large, facing so many complicated problems, you need that machinery to get all possible options before the President."

But Rogers is more reticent about his special power in urging favorite

"Of course, he does not know where that policy will end up." said one adviser. "He does not approach the matter like a chess-player, always looking three steps ahead. Whether we eventually recognize Peking, what we do about Taiwan, all lie in the future. For the moment, Rogers simply agrees that we can continue to support Chiang Kai-shek and at the same time stop ignoring a government which controls 800 million people on the mainland."

Rogers also had a big role in what he calls the "historic decision" last year to return Okinawa to Japan and re-arrange the whole American alliance with that growing Pacific power. Those in the know say he gave battle against military qualms over agreement to remove nuclear weapons from the strategic island.

"He was really on the telephone on that one," said one official. "He thoroughly immersed himself in all sides of the question. By the time he got to the National Security Council and the President he had a thoroughly prepared lawyer's brief. In short, they knew he knew what he was talking about on Okinawa."

Rogers says his greatest disappointment of the year was inability to move the Soviet Union on the Middle East. At the United Nations in October he thought he had agreement with Andrei Gromyko on a new formula for opening negotiations between the Israelis and Arabs, but by November it was clear the Russians had reneged.

"I suppose my Dec. 9 speech outlining our Middle East policy was my most controversial act of the year," he said. "I am not shocked by the adverse reaction of both the Israelis and Arabs. I suppose it shows we are fair. I think it is a sound position, it is the position of my department, and I intend to stick to it."

IT CAN BE ARGUED that Rogers' real test is yet to come. Neither he nor the administration have faced a real crisis—like the Dominican Republic uot-burst or the 1967 Middle East war under Johnson or the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban missiles crisis under Kennedy. The only potential crisis — the North Korean downing of a naval reconnaissance plane in April — did not become a real one because Nixon, with Rogers' backing, determined that it should not be.

"No one knows what will happen when they do not have that option, and the crisis is there whether they choose to call it one or not," said one inside observer.

But Rogers has had his year of preparation. The administration has had the luxury of time to sort out complicated problems and inaugurate thoughtful policies. In the process the new secretary of state has shown that he is no lightweight, but a man ready and willing to make decisions—and to make them stick.

NEW YORK : POST : WEDNESDAY : JUNE 10, 1970

Clayton Fritchey

ROGERS AND OUT

WASHINGTON.

There is only one thing worse than
giving a President advice he doesn't
want to hear, and that's giving him ad-
vice which, after being rejected, turns
out to be right. Secretary of State
Rogers is guilty on both counts, which
explains why his influence on Adminis-
tration policy, especially in Southeast
Asia, is fast fading.

This may please the Pentagon and
the Kissinger bloc in the White House,
for their ascendancy over the State
Dept. is now clearly established, but
it troubles others who rightly regard
Rogers as an able and astute adviser,
a highly competent and experienced
public official, and, above all, a man
with a remarkable record of sound
political judgment.

There was a time (before Nixon be-
came preoccupied with Vietnam and
Cambodia) when the President liked to
call attention to his old friend's poise
and judgment in critical situations.
Nixon has said that Rogers was the
first person he turned to in his own
"crises." He also said he invariably got
good advice.

There seems to be no outward breach
in their friendship, yet it is plain that
Roger' role is gradually being reduced
to a ceremonial one, centering on re-
ceiving foreign ambassadors and visit-
ing dignitaries, attending International
conferences, and mollifying Congress.
When Nixon, like Johnson, became ad-

dicted to the war, and resumed his
old hard-line ways, it was probably in-
evitable that he would listen more and
more to the military and less and less
to Rogers.

The Secretary is neither an ideologue
nor a cold warrior. Like a good lawyer
(he was Attorney General under Eisen-
hower), he does not court confronta-
tions. He saw Vietnam destroy Lyndon
Johnson, and so he came to office con-
vinced the war was a fatal political
liability that should be quickly liquid-
ated. He believes foreign initiatives
must be harmonized with domestic
policy. He appreciates and respects the
role of Congress in foreign affairs. And
finally, he abhors polarization.

Nevertheless, Rogers has loyally sup-
ported Administration policies. In pri-
vate, as in public, he keeps his reserva-
tions to himself. Still, it is not hard to
see that things would be different. and
Nixon would have avoided some of his
present difficulties, if the basic views
of Rogers had prevailed.

Neither McGeorge Bundy nor Walt
Rostow, who preceded Henry Kissinger
as White House National Security
Adviser, ever succeeded in supplanting
Secretary of State Rusk in the way
Kissinger has supplanted Rogers. But
then Kissinger is a virtuoso at proving
that Nixon is a genius on foreign policy
no matter what decision he makes, bad,
good, or indifferent.

Nixon's chronic hostility to the State
Dept. is well known, but if he cares at

all about its morale, there should not
be a repetition of the open snub given
Rogers and his chief associates when
they were excluded from the highly-
publicized Cambodia conference recently
held at the Western White House in
San Clemente, Cal.

The President was flanked by Gen.
Wheeler, the retiring chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Adm. Thomas
Moorer, his successor. Alongside were
Gen. Abrams, U. S. Commander in Viet-
nam, and Adm. McCain, commander of
U. S. forces in the Pacific. The Pentagon
was also represented by Defense Secre-
tary Laird, and his deputy, David Pack-
ard. The inner circle was completed by
Prof. Kissinger.

In short, the Pentagon had six of-
ficials present; State had none. As the
conferees met, Secretary Rogers was in
the air over the Atlantic, flying back
from a leisurely visit to Portugal. If,
however, he had been wanted at San
Clemente, he could easily have taken
off a few hours earlier and flown direct
to California.

The Under Secretary of State, Elliott
Richardson (since named HEW Secre-
tary), was available, but not invited.
Also omitted were the number one
career officer at State, U. Alexis John-
son, and the assistant secretary in
charge of Asian affairs.

It is hard to believe that a President
would make crucial decisions on South-
east Asia without consulting his Con-
stitutional advisers on foreign policy.
It is lamely said that the conference
was mostly about military matters, but
since when have they become independ-
ent of foreign policy? In most countries,
military policy is still a branch of for-
ign policy.

PACIFIC COMMANDER, CONTINUED

our leadership potential and credi-
bility as an ally in other areas of
the world.

"It will lend encouragement to
groups struggling for indepen-
dence and progress in freedom."

A military command such as
McCain's — stretching from the
West Coast of the United States to
the middle of the Indian Ocean and
covering 85 million square miles—
must come up with specific recom-
mendations as to U.S. strategy and
tactics.

"In my judgment," McCain
said, "this country's military con-
tribution to the overall challenge
must follow three basic guidelines:

"It must be a collective one.

"It must be a flexible one.

"It must be a sustained one."

McCain feels that the collective
security concept has a broad and
complex meaning, since it must be
adapted to the combined influences
of self-conscious nationalism and
the modern day communications
explosion.

"Together, these have resulted
in a mushrooming of popular ex-
pectations and the fanning of both
new and ancient resentments and
tensions," he said.

"Now, it has become the general consensus of free Asian leaders that 'nation building' is the concept most responsive to these conditions. It is a vast objective that must start out on the individual level by drawing together and relating a plethora of national resources and needs, and all this under conditions of constant stress, internal and external. Being an ongoing process, it will mean a continuing and determined effort for many years to come."

The wiry admiral emphasizes
this point:

"Of one thing we can all be sure.
The Communists will exploit to the
fullest—politically, diplomatically
and militarily — every individual
weakness and instability that
might hinder constructive and co-
operative nation building by Asia's
free countries."

How, then, does collective secur-
ity fit into this?

McCain contends that it must
identify Asian needs as they apply
to the individual countries, relat-
ing them in a collective effort.

"This command. I am happy to

cated electronic gear, has made a
point of building personal trust
and goodwill among America's
partners in the Pacific.

"As Commander-in-Chief, Pa-
cific," he said, "I have traveled ex-
tensively to meet my counterparts
among our allies and friends and I
am confident that these contacts
not only help to expedite our work
together but also contribute
broadly to enhanced morale."

Turning to another subject—
nuclear deterrence—McCain said:

"To put it briefly, our nuclear
umbrella in the Pacific has un-
questionably helped to free the
region of those gut fears of Chi-
nese intimidation that would other-
wise have deterred participation in
new experiments at cooperation."

McCain notes that the potential
military threats in Asia range
across an enormous geographic ex-
panse, including some of the
world's most strategic locations.

"They may take shape on land or sea," he said, "in a variety of time frames and in numerous forms, including nuclear threat, blackmail or even attack; conventional aggression across well-defined borders; subversion and infiltration; obstruction of free passage along international sea-lanes, and international piracy."

"While we expect the Asian nations to assume more and more responsibility for defending themselves," he added, "the military challenge to the United States is to be able to respond in a flexible and discriminating manner to this variety of military contingencies.

"The history of the past 20 years gives us a fair idea of what this can mean in practice, running from 'eyeball to eyeball' nuclear confrontation during the Cuba missile crisis of 1962 to the successful 'show of force' landing on the beaches of Lebanon outside Beirut in 1958."

McCain said there are several
major ingredients which go into
creating and maintaining such an
extensive military presence, in-
cluding:

"1. A broad spectrum of tech-
nological developments that allow
us to be militarily responsive and
effective in any challenge.

"2. Adequate personnel-in-being,

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR

9 JULY 1970

Red subs in the sunset?

A delegation from Communist China is
in Ceylon.

Its mission: to survey what aid is needed
by the new leftist government of Prime
Minister Sirimavo Bandaranaike, who was
returned to office in May.

The Prime Minister already has accepted
a Chinese offer to construct a "Bandara-
naike Memorial Hall." It will honor her late
husband whom she succeeded in office in
1960 after his assassination.

What New Delhi fears is that any aid
from Peking may have the end result of
Ceylon's letting the Chinese Communists
use the former British naval base at Trin-
comalee — so vital to the Allies during
World War II following the fall of Singa-
pore.

Access to the base would give Peking a
supply facility on the Indian Ocean. From
there its fleet of conventional submarines
could challenge the Soviet Navy, which has
been steadily moving into the area.

ation this way:

"Communist ambitions and hos-
tility vis-a-vis their neighbors runs
strong, and their past employment
of threats and violence does not
bode well for the future.

"The emergence of a nuclear
China poses dangers that are not
yet clear.

"Individual nation-building ef-
forts as well as patterns of regional
cooperation are moving ahead but
are still vulnerable to disruption."

McCain feels that a continuing
and flexible U.S. military presence
can help to meet these challenges.

"Many courageous decisions will
have to be taken individually and
collectively by our friends in the
area," he said, "and our sustained
support will contribute in a vital
way to their confidence in such
matters.

"Fundamentally, the prospects
for successful collective security in
the Pacific will depend on the long-
run public support and under-
standing of all the peoples involved.
And there is no question that this
dimension faces obstacles.

"Thus, quickly evolving events
and changing patterns in Asia may
tend to distract attention from
long-run requirements. The finan-
cial burdens and strong efforts in-
volved in nation-building may turn

## Vietnam: How Nixon Plans to Win the War

FOR SEVERAL MONTHS NOW the war in Indochina has been in a cryptic phase. On the one hand, there is no apparent slackening in the Nixon Administration's determination to "win" in Vietnam; on the other, in the cities of Vietnam the most important peace push in years has gathered strength, with the forbearance—perhaps even the blessing—of White House strategists.

On September 21, a rich landowner and prominent anti-Communist member of the South Vietnamese Assembly, Ngo Cong Duc, made a dramatic proposal for peace which has become the central document of the new peace coalition. The basic demands of the vast majority of the Vietnamese people, said Duc, are "the withdrawal of all American and foreign troops from South Vietnam . . . [and] an immediate cessation of the war, in order to permit the Vietnamese to work out their problems themselves." Duc emphasized that his supporters were opposed to the "communization" of South Vietnam but were willing to take their chances with the Communists rather than allow their country to be obliterated by an endless war. Duc called for the Paris peace talks to include a delegation of non-Communist forces, with the idea that the enlarged conference could establish a neutralist government in South Vietnam which could hold free elections. (In Saigon, Duc's proposal was publicly acclaimed

by his active supporters—the Buddhist movement, the students and faculty of the universities, the war victims, the women's movement, even moderate Catholics.)

One of the most intriguing developments of the new political situation is that these peace forces appear to be coalescing for the first time around former General Duong Van Minh ("Big Minh"), who in 1963, apparently as the CIA's protégé, overthrew Diem in the first generals' coup. Minh recently announced his candidacy for the 1971 elections, while Thieu has indicated that he will not run again. Even more intriguing is that the Duc proposal and Minh's candidacy seem to have the tacit approval of the NLF and the DRV, while in the U.S. the Duc statement has been praised by Rennie Davis of the Chicago Conspiracy as "the way to end the war."

This unusual convergence of forces in part reflects a transitional stage in the struggle, a jockeying for positions in anticipation of the next phase. Evidently the NLF is confident of its political strength for any contest in which the contenders are Vietnamese, with the U.S. troops and B-52s reasonably withdrawn from the scene. But what can explain the Nixon Administration's own willingness to encourage such developments, particularly when there is no evidence that there has been any abandonment in Washington of the

by Banning Garrett