PROGRESSIVE
Policy and Propaganda Tt may seem paradoxical that the Eisenhower Administration, which has harnessed the instruments of Madison Avenue publicity and propaganda for its own political purposes more...
...Moreover, the Kremlin knew, as did the whole world, that the United States was about to launch a new series of major tests in the Pacific...
...The author of these words was John Foster Dulles, who was passing bitter judgment on the policies of his predecessor, Dean Acheson, but they apply with ever greater force today than they did then...
...The immediate cause of it is, no doubt, the debility of the President's role in world affairs, and its accompaniment, perhaps its inevitable accompaniment—the negativism of Secretary Dulles...
...The lack of clear-cut direction in U.S...
...We consider it to be our principal aim to reach agreement with other powers on the unconditional banning of atomic and hydrogen weapons of all kinds, ending production thereof, and completely destroying stockpiles of these weapons with proper control...
...Clearly our refusal to respond to a proposal that comes close to paralleling our own proclaimed position must raise the question whether we have meant anything we have said—whether we have any policy at all except a cranky determination to go our own way and ignore the wishes of most of mankind...
...But it looked in vain as the Dulles-Eisenhower team clung to its sullen, negative approach to foreign affairs...
...We draw a line which, like the Maginot Line, we then fortify as our defense . . . The result...
...It takes pretty close to a year to analyze the results of a test series and prepare for additional tests, which means that the Soviets would normally not be making further tests this year even if they had not decided to issue their dramatic announcement...
...On both counts the Soviet timing was diabolically clever...
...It could only say "No" in a dozen different ways...
...Walter Lippmann, for example, reported after a swing through Europe that it is "only too obvious that there is a great decline in American influence...
...Propaganda can interpret policy, explain its significance, make it more appealing, and recruit a following for that policy...
...We have no affirmative policies beyond...
...The Russians had just completed a series of 14 nuclear test explosions, six of them less than a fortnight before announcing the suspension of further tests...
...The Eisenhower Administration, in fact, has behaved as though it didn't give a hoot for world opinion...
...it cannot be substituted for policy...
...But the paradox dissolves when one realizes that propaganda, regardless of its cunning and slickness, is not a thing apart...
...It might, for example, have said to the Soviets: "You have just completed your tests...
...foreign policy was rarely more glaringly evident than during the past month...
...But much of the world was enormously impressed by the Soviet declaration and looked to the United States for some measure of agreement that might end the danger of nuclear fallout...
...Sheer propaganda," said Secretary of State John Foster Dulles...
...Here, potentially, was a vastly more significant expression by the Soviets than the announcement of nuclear test suspension...
...Although it knew of Soviet intentions for weeks before the Gromyko announcement, the Administration was totally unprepared to meet the Soviet challenge...
...We shall suspend our tests if you will agree now to an effective system of detection and enforcement...
...And this in the face of that fact that a significant aspect of the struggle between Communism and the West is a competition for the loyalties of the uncommitted millions of people throughout the world...
...The Administration's recent and current failures in foreign affairs flow far less from faulty propaganda techniques—although these, too, have seemed dismally inadequate—than from the absence of an affirmative policy that would appeal to the peoples of the world who hunger for an end to the menace of nuclear warfare and the perils of testing nuclear weapons...
...The nation whose Declaration of Independence was inspired by "a decent respect to the opinions of mankind," moves on the world stage as though it were wholly indifferent to the deepest aspirations of people in every country on earth...
...is the staking out of a citadel, which we then try to fortify and provision...
...It is not like us to be on the defensive and to be fearful .. . What we lack is a righteous and dynamic faith . . . Today our military leaders define what they conceive to be strategic areas for military defense...
...the West, 18 per cent: don't know, 28 per cent—a three to one verdict for the Soviets...
...That way we can show the whole world we both mean what we say...
...Best of all, the Administration might have said to the Kremlin: "We accept your challenge...
...But propaganda cannot be a replacement for policy...
...In the speech in which he announced the test ban, Gromyko said: "We realize the ending of tests would not fully remove the danger of atomic war...
...Eight years ago a prominent American diplomat made this critical estimate of American foreign policy: "Something has gone wrong with our nation, or we should not be in our plight and mood...
...We said none of these things...
...The Soviet announcement, and especially its timing, constituted a shrewd and tricky maneuver by the Kremlin...
...we, as you know, are about to have ours...
...The Administration might have offered, on the other hand, to negotiate an agreement to limit the number and volume of future tests on both sides, regulating the amount of fallout to be released...
...Another example—one of many—was a poll conducted in New Delhi on the question: "Which is doing more to help peace in the world, Russia or the West...
...We have never been so completely on the defensive, rarely been so fearful, and never have we been so lacking in affirmative policies...
...Gimmick," said President Eisenhower...
...But there was nothing but grim silence in the White House and the State Department...
...Here, too, was dramatic evidence that the Kremlin might now be in a mood to negotiate on the very terms we have demanded for so long...
...The Administration has been unyielding for months in its determination that there shall be no suspension of nuclear tests unless such a ban were accompanied by agreement to halt the production of fissionable materials for weapons...
...The response: Russia, 54 per cent...
...Why don't we use this period to seek agreement on an experimental suspension of tests under strict inspection and enforcement...
...There have been countless indications in recent months that we are losing this competition with the Soviets, that American stock is sinking rapidly in the world opinion market...
...We simply said no, in the same sour, dreary way that has become a hallmark of Dulles diplomacy, leaving much of the world convinced that we are not interested in suspending nuclear tests—under any terms...
...President Eisenhower— whip-sawed by contending factions in his own Administration—symbolized the confusion and indecision by proclaiming that the Administration might be willing to enter into a suspension of weapons tests without insisting, as before, on a ban on the production of fissionable material for weapons, and then retreating almost completely from that position a few days later...
...In his speech announcing the new Soviet policy, Foreign Minister Gromyko called on the other nuclear powers, the United States and Great Britain, to follow suit, but both have refused...
...Eisenhower was moved to make his contradictory comments as a consequence of the Soviet Union's dramatic announcement that it was unilaterally suspending tests of atomic and hydrogen bombs...
...8sb9s B89& wSBt Equally striking is the way in which both the President and the Secretary of State ignored a significant portion of the Gromyko address...
...There were many creative possibilities the Administration might have explored to determine if the Soviets were interested in more than propaganda victories, but it ignored them all...
...Policy and Propaganda Tt may seem paradoxical that the Eisenhower Administration, which has harnessed the instruments of Madison Avenue publicity and propaganda for its own political purposes more cleverly than any other Administration in history, should find itself today a self-admitted propaganda failure in foreign affairs...
Vol. 22 • May 1958 • No. 5
