Fighting the Backbiting

By WALTER ISAACSON

Once more--with bad feeling--there is squabbling over U.S. foreign policy

Just when Alexander Haig thought it was safe to go back into the water, with the internecine foreign policy disputes that have characterized his tenure seemingly flushed away by the Administration's victory on the sale of AWACS planes to Saudi Arabia, the Secretary of State once again felt the chill of sharks in the White House out to get him. Though only their dorsal fins were visible, it was generally assumed that lurking beneath the surface of rumor and innuendo was Haig's natural adversary, National Security Adviser Richard Allen. The two have had their differences in the past, but a new and uncommonly vicious outbreak of backbiting last week showed just how debilitating such a feud can be, to the participants and to the consistency and credibility of U.S. foreign policy.

The dance of the incisors occurred at a time when the Administration was being encircled by problems that threatened Reagan's reputation as an executive. Yet he and his chief aides were forced to spend precious time quelling the controversy. The episode began when White House Staff Director David Gergen saw an advance copy of a column by Jack Anderson. Administration sources, Anderson wrote, said that Haig "has one foot on a banana peel" and might fall soon. Gergen called Haig, who called Anderson. The rumors, the Secretary of State told the columnist, were the work of a top White House aide who has been running a "guerrilla campaign" against him that was tantamount to a "sabotage of the President."

Haig also called Reagan at Camp David, who was sent a copy of the unpublished column. Reagan, already irritated by the continuing talk of intramural dissent, became even angrier. He called Anderson himself. "We haven't had a Secretary who was so well thought of in years," the President said. The tempest became public when Anderson published a revised column that included all of the top-level protestations.

Allen responded that he was not the subject of Haig's accusation, even though he has been known to make an occasional caustic remark about the Secretary of State. "As a matter of fact, Haig called me to say that he knows it's not me," said Allen. Chief of Staff James Baker, one of Haig's prime suspects, similarly denied being the culprit. Said Baker: "Someone led him to believe that I was the source of the rumor that he would be fired. We cleared that up." So who is it? "I don't know," said Allen; "my solution is polygraphs at 30 paces. Wait! I'm only kidding."

In fact, there is probably no single individual intent on sabotaging the Secretary. Rather, there is a general feeling at the White House that Haig, a complex and emotional man who tensely guards his prerogatives, has trouble being the type of amiable team player that Reagan likes to have around. Haig's aides agree that the Secretary harbors a pent-up frustration toward Reagan's top advisers, who lack foreign policy expertise and often constrain his actions. In a recent outburst to three of his close aides, Haig declared that the White House is a "rain barrel" of reverberating noise and that he is the only official prepared for action.

Haig may have a point there. Officials at the White House and State seem to spend more time dispensing nasty rumors about each other than they devote to policy. For a month, reports have had either Haig or Allen, or both, about to be fired, and others moved. Reagan was reduced to blaming those who published the gossip rather than trying to throttle the original sources.

Reagan last week finally called Haig and Allen to a private chat in the Oval Office. The President firmly lectured the two adversaries for an hour, insisting that the bickering must stop. It was a disservice to him and the country, he said, and the two top players must control themselves and their staffs. Haig and Allen promised to keep each other better informed of their thoughts and intentions, to "roundtable" policy options, as Reagan likes to put it.

While Haig was moving toward a truce with Allen and the White House, the Secretary of State inadvertently opened a new skirmish with Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, with whom he has clashed before. Haig was appearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to explain the Administration's $180 billion plan to upgrade the U.S. nuclear arsenal. He remarked that NATO contingency plans include the option "to fire a nuclear weapon for demonstrative purposes" to deter a massive conventional-force Soviet thrust into Europe. Haig did not say where this warning shot would be detonated. His point, mainly lost in the ensuing response among skittish European allies, was that the U.S. would attempt to contain any future European conflict at the lowest possible level. The following day, Weinberger went before the same committee and directly contradicted Haig's warning-shot-across-the-bow doctrine. Something of the sort had been suggested in the 1960's, he said, but had never become NATO policy. Said Weinberger: "There is nothing in any plan that I know of that contains anything remotely resembling that, nor should it."

In fact, NATO's European defense strategy has long been based on the assumption that the allies might not counter a full-scale conventional attack by the Soviets, and thus must depend on a possible nuclear response as a deterrent. That is not, however, an issue the Administration wants to see publicly debated, particularly by members of its own Cabinet. The White House and the Pentagon issued a statement papering over the disagreement, but it did little to erase the impression of disarray among Administration policymakers.

The Secretary also reopened an old disagreement with the Pentagon over the proper U.S. role in El Salvador. Haig wants increased U.S. military aid to the government of Jose Napoleon Duarte, which is stalemated in its war against leftist insurgents. The Secretary indicated that he was considering military steps, perhaps including naval action, to halt the flow of arms to the rebels from Cuba and Nicaragua. In what several Administration officials call ''an inversion of roles," Weinberger and his Pentagon aides have opposed Haig's State Department on that question, arguing that U.S. military involvement in El Salvador would be ineffective and ultimately dangerous.

Haig also found himself leading the Administration away from its longstanding position that human rights should be de-emphasized as a factor in foreign policy. Last week it was disclosed that he has approved a State Department memorandum asserting that the U.S. must take a strong stand on political freedom and domestic political rights in order to present a moral alternative to the Soviet Union. The Administration's previous attitude on human rights was illustrated by the nomination of Ernest Lefever, a right-wing ideologue who had sharply criticized the Carter Administration for emphasizing human rights in its foreign policy, to be Assistant Secretary for Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs. Ever since Lefever was rejected by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on June 5, the post has remained unfilled. A more moderate candidate has now been nominated: Elliott Abrams, 33, a former aide to Democratic Senators Henry Jackson and Daniel Patrick Moynihan.

Last week's family quarreling probably confirmed the impression among U.S. allies and enemies alike that the Reagan Administration's policymaking apparatus suffers from inconsistency, drift and disarray. That is a curious failing for a President pledged to end the inconsistency, drift and disarray that marked his predecessor's actions in the world. The Administration's China policy, for instance, is on the verge of unraveling because of Peking's opposition to the possible sale of new weapons and fighter jets to Taiwan. Talks with the Soviets on limiting the deployment of so-called Theater Nuclear Weapons in Europe are due to begin this month. But the Administration has so far not worked out a policy for the talks.

Part of the problem is that fissures among Reagan's policymakers have gone unattended while the President concentrated on getting his tax and spending cuts through Congress. So far Reagan has not shown the inclination to deal with the complexities of foreign affairs personally. Nor has his top policy counsellor, Edwin Meese, stepped in to fill the void. But the White House needs more than a keener interest in foreign affairs, essential as that is. Reagan's benign style of management has allowed what should have been showers to turn into tornadoes. He and Meese could have spared themselves, and the country, a good deal of trouble if they had laid down the law much earlier and firmly insisted that those who make diplomacy practice it among themselves.

--By Walter Isaacson. Reported by Laurence I. Barrett and Gregory H. Wierzynski/Washington

With reporting by Laurence I. Barrett, Gregory H. Wierzynski

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