Hunting for a Policy

"Africa," said Secretary of State William Rogers in Addis Ababa last week, "is going to be more important in the thinking of the U.S. in the future." It could scarcely be less. In the recent past, Africa has ranked at or near the bottom of every U.S. priority list. Direct economic aid totals just $154 million this year, compared to $52 million for Laos alone. Rogers, the first U.S. Secretary of State to visit the continent, seems determined to make some changes--provided the price is right.

"It may well be," Rogers told TIME'S John Blashill as his Air Force 707 jet streaked south from Addis toward Nairobi, "that the U.S. can play a major role in channeling the African nations toward regional development--without spending too much money." Given the prevailing "no-foreign-entanglements" mood of Congress, sizable increases in U.S. aid to Africa are unlikely in any case. Thus Rogers intends to supplement aid "by looking for ways to encourage private investment."

Four Principles. Since the end of the Congo rebellion in the mid-1960s, the U.S. has been content to maintain a profile so low as to be nearly invisible. As a result, Black African feelings about the U.S. are lukewarm at best. In North Africa, however, the position is slightly different. In both Morocco and Tunisia, first and second among Africa's nations in total U.S. aid, Rogers found a definite coolness. That was largely because of the Arabs' distaste for what they see as Washington's pro-Israel policy. In Morocco, Rogers made a few polite remarks at the airport; when the microphone was passed to Foreign Minister Abdelhabi Boutaleb, he stood to leave without a word. Said one official: "No Arab state today, even one as far removed from the actual conflict as Morocco, can afford to be too warm in its relations with the United States in these times." That point was made even more clearly in Tunis, where some 2,000 screaming students staged a five-hour anti-U.S. demonstration on the day of Rogers' arrival.

In contrast to the stormy scenes in North Africa, Rogers' welcome to Ethiopia was calm. On arriving in Addis, Rogers laid out the four basic principles on which U.S.-African policy would be based: 1) opposition to "systems based on racial discrimination" --a clear slap at the governments of South Africa, Rhodesia and the Portuguese colonies of Angola and Mozambique; 2) "deep respect for the independence and sovereignty of African nations"; 3) recognition of a "special obligation" to assist African economic development; and 4) the intent to help Africa keep out of struggles between the big-power blocs.

Rogers talked three times with Emperor Haile Selassie. The Emperor put in a strong bid for more arms, largely, he said, because the Soviets were gaining alarming influence in neighboring Somalia and the Sudan. Selassie said little of the domestic unrest that forced him to close the national university and most high schools last month. He was equally bland about the activities of the Damascus-based Eritrean Liberation Front, which is fighting to establish a separate Eritrean state in northern Ethiopia. In the past six months, the front has hijacked three Ethiopian Airlines planes and kidnaped (briefly) the U.S. consul general in the northern city of Asmara.

No Cemeteries. Perhaps the liveliest moment in Addis came when Diallo Telli, the abrasive Guinean who serves as secretary general of the Organization for African Unity, complained to Rogers that the U.S. was not helping Africa in its battle against white racism in the southern nations. He told Rogers that he had seen the American cemeteries on the battlefields of World War II, when the U.S. fought against fascism. To that, Rogers had a sharp retort. Stating that the U.S. was interested only in solving African problems by peaceful means, he added: "We hope there will be no American cemeteries in Africa in the future."

Late in the week, Rogers conferred in Nairobi with Kenyan President Jomo Kenyatta, then planned to spend the weekend watching elephants in the wild splendors of Tsavo National Park, 150 miles from the capital. "Let's not call it a day off," he told his staff. "Let's call it a fact-finding expedition." Facts, after all, are what he is looking for --and over the next stops on his ten-country, two-week trip--Zambia, the Congo, Cameroun, Nigeria, Ghana and Liberia--Rogers will be looking hard for areas in which U.S. aid can be more effectively used.

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