The Risks of Billboard Diplomacy

Returning from a nine-day visit to Western Europe and the Middle East, a high U.S. official gave a background briefing to reporters aboard Secretary of State Alexander Haig's jet. The official who, of course, was quickly revealed to be Haig himself admitted that in the future he would have to be more careful in his anti-Soviet remarks, lest they give the Kremlin leaders an additional excuse to invade Poland. TIME Diplomatic Correspondent Strobe Talbott believes there are other dangers, too, that Haig should keep in mind. Talbott's analysis:

So far, the Reagan Administration seems to have been almost spoiling for a skirmish with the Soviets, or at least a shouting match. It has also shown a disturbing tendency to treat virtually every international problem as a manifestation of the U.S.-U.S.S.R. rivalry. Haig returned home last week insisting that friends of the U.S. in Europe and the Middle East were reassured by America's determination to stand up to Soviet expansionism. But he also seemed somewhat chastened by criticism of the tenor of U.S. policy, as well he should be. Haig will soon be supervising an interagency review of East-West relations, and he hopes the outcome will be a more modulated and pragmatic approach to the challenge of dealing with the Kremlin.

Achieving that goal may be complicated by opposition to Haig inside the Administration from numerous hawks and ideologues in sub-Cabinet positions, by pressure from powerful right-wing Senators, and perhaps by the hard-line instincts of the President himself. The confrontational overtones of the Reagan foreign policy to date hark back to a vigorously anti-Soviet presidential campaign and, before that, to Reagan's long career as an unabashedly old-fashioned anti-Communist speaker on the Republican rubber-chicken circuit. Reagan felt all the more justified in making anti-Sovietism the cornerstone of his foreign policy since he came to office in a landslide victory over Jimmy Carter, who was generally perceived as soft on the Soviet challenge. There is little question that many Americans were ready for a tough stance--and, indeed, that one was necessary--given the U.S.S.R.'s recent record of what Winston Lord, president of the Council on Foreign Relations, has called "geopolitical arrogance" in Africa, Indochina and Afghanistan.

Reagan's aides say that their man has a resounding mandate from the American electorate to threaten and punish the U.S.S.R., and if the Soviets make one false move in Poland or anywhere else, to foreclose indefinitely any improvement in East-West relations. Some of the more hawkish members of the Administration, particularly at the Pentagon and National Security Council, want to keep arms control on the back burner with the heat turned low, while they concentrate on a unilateral arms buildup and other measures to combat Soviet power. Whether there is strong domestic political support for such a policy remains to be seen. Some of the Administration's own polling indicates that the public wants firm defense; but there is also broad support for arms control, and there seems to be little stomach for a new, all-out arms race or cold war.

The views of America's allies are even clearer: they are adamant that the Reagan Administration pursue a "two track" policy of building up defenses while making a good-faith attempt to negotiate with the Soviets. A number of West European officials have politely but firmly told visitors from Washington that they consider the initial anti-Soviet thrust of Reagan foreign policy excessive and obsessive. Galled by that attitude from across the Atlantic, some second-echelon hard-liners in the Administration have gone so far as to hope for a Soviet invasion of Poland. It would, they believe, galvanize both domestic and allied support for the policies they favor. Haig emphatically opposes this notion.

Even if the Warsaw Pact forces finally intervene in Poland, the Kremlin may be able to hold off doing so for months or years, garnering credit from the West Europeans in the meantime for appearing restrained. That is all the more likely if U.S. Cabinet members run around the globe crying "wolf, wolf," proclaiming that an invasion is imminent every few weeks.

As for the Middle East, Haig had gone there with the announced intention of seeking a "strategic consensus" on the Soviet menance. Instead, the Secretary got lectures from King Hussein of Jordan and the Saudi leaders on what they consider the more immediate and dangerous problem of Israeli intransigence on the issue of Palestinian autonomy. Haig argues that such statements were predictable and do not necessarily reflect those governments' true feelings. But public polemics beween himself and pro-Western Arabs over who constitutes the biggest threat to the region only accentuate the impression that the Administration has so far failed to come up with effective new initiatives for the Middle East.

Similarly, the Administration--with Haig in the lead--made the mistake of overblowing its claim that the ugly little war in El Salvador is a showdown between Soviet-Cuban expansionism and American resolve. There is little doubt that the Cubans and their Sandinista friends in Nicaragua have supplied the Salvadoran leftist guerrillas with arms. But by casting the Central American conflict in apocalyptic East-West terms, the U.S. has already prompted criticism from Western Europe, Canada, Mexico, Venezuela and even China.

The Administration has toned down its rhetoric over El Salvador, but it has yet to calm renewed fears among Third World countries everywhere, particularly in Southern Africa, that the U.S. is now inclined to treat them solely as pawns on the Soviet-American chessboard. America's recent sizable donations to a fund for assisting African refugees (unmatched by a single ruble from the Soviets) and the current mission to Africa by a still unconfirmed Assistant Secretary of State (see WORLD) suggest an effort to assuage these feelings. To be sure, the U.S.S.R. regards Third World countries strictly as pawns. But then the U.S.S.R. tries to influence other countries almost exclusively by brute force and revolutionary ideology (which implies the threat of force), while the U.S. depends on the more subtle instruments of diplomacy, politics, trade and foreign aid.

Name calling, no matter how justified, is no substitute for policy and strategy. Haig now seems more aware of the difference than he was before and committed to making the transition from sloganeering to statesmanship. The question is whether he will be able to bring the rest of the Administration along with him.

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