A Touch of the Healing Grace

By Hugh Sidey

In the conduct of foreign policy, Jimmy Carter's presidency has become profoundly personal. His initiatives often emerge from his heart, his reasoning is founded to an extraordinary degree on his religious feelings, and his preparations are made in the deepest secrecy. The extent to which he differs from his predeccessors and has changed his original intentions is only now fully appreciated.

His approach is hailed by his partisans for its innovativeness, courage and commitment. But it is increasingly questioned by critics for the jolts it produces and the perception of self-centered leadership it creates. These leaders believe Carter does not see far enough ahead before he moves.

A few days before the latest Middle East maneuvers, Carter was talking in private about calling another Camp David summit meeting with Israel's Menachem Begin and Egypt's Anwar Sadat. There was a compulsion in his mannerism as if something drew him to the mountain, so much so that he hardly considered that the two men would turn him down. His next move was to enlarge his personal commitment, to get on the phone to Sadat, to invite Begin to the White House for a personal and intimate conference. Carter conferred, joined Begin in a Sabbath dinner, asked the Prime Minister back to the White House the next night for more talks around the family table.

The following morning the President was up early and off to teach a Bible class at the First Baptist Church, where he brooded aloud about the impasse. In the next few hours the idea of a pilgrimage to the Middle East took root. Again, there was the feeling that it was something inside Carter that he could not deny himself.

Carter aides cast the journey in personal terms, almost as if the President stood apart from the nation. Their accounts of Carter's determination shone with the bright hopes of the missionary, the sense left with listeners that only Carter could bring the healing grace.

The assessment of this adventure lies on down the road, perhaps months away, as has been the case with most of the President's international initiatives. The record is not encouraging. Dramatic moments too often were revealed in hindsight to have been hastily prepared. Some people fear that an Israeli-Egyptian treaty could isolate Sadat in the Arab world, deepen hostility to the U. S. and ultimately create grave threats to our oil imports. Carter hears these doubts--or does he? The increasingly personal nature of his leadership sometimes seems to be a protective device destined to give him room to maneuver but also keeping him from seeing the real world. Sincerity and warmth, changes of language and diversionary drama replace substantive progress. Surprise is an effective diplomatic device, but most successful "surprises" in recent years have been carefully crafted and virtually assured of success before being sprung.

Amid the rising concerns about his leadership, Carter has talked more and more about the stabilizing force of his religion. In White House meetings his perception of the world frequently seems biblical, touching on a "dying child," " the downtrodden," "the despised," the link between leadership and"deep religious conviction," the courage of nonviolence.

Almost no one can argue With the emotional beauty of President's thoughts, but his actions emerge as a series of emotional responses rather than the work of an integrating intelligence, which is a crucial quality for leadership on a globe so intricately and tightly bound.

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