U.S. DIPLOMACY TAKES WIDER VIEW

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31077, 4 June 1966, Page 17

U.S. DIPLOMACY TAKES WIDER VIEW

(N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) WASHINGTON, June 3.

President Johnson’s latest effort to open up a conversation with the Chinese leaders on disarmament and Vietnam is not likely to get anywhere. But it is significant just the same, James Reston wrote for the “New York Times.”

Reston wrote: The President is clearly trying now to keep Vietnam from paralysing American diplomacy in other parts of the world. He is active again in Europe, and in Latin America.

He went out of his way a few days ago to call in all the African Ambassadors for a definition of American

policy In that continent, and he has been working diligently behind the scenes in the hope of improving relations between India and Pakistan, and opening new channels of trade with the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. There Is not yet much progress to report, except perhaps in his effective efforts to improve the economic condition and the diplomatic relations on the Indian subcontinent, but he is moving again and trying to make up for the time lost in his preoccupation with the Vietnamese war.

His latest initiative with China illustrates this wider perspective. He at first turned down a proposal from Peking to enter into an agreement not to be the first to use nuclear weapons. He did so because China seemed merely to be engaged in a propaganda move to cover her last nuclear test

However, when this was criticised as a negative attitude, he instructed the Warsaw Ambassador, Mr Gronou-

ski, to ask the Chinese for clarification of their offer of a no-first-strike agreement. Did this mean that China was also interested in signing the treaty against nuclear testing in the atmosphere? Nothing has come of this question as yet and nothing is likely to, because if China stopped nuclear testing now it would freeze its nuclear programme at a stage far below that of the other nuclear powers. But at least the approach to China indicates a new willingness to look for positive initiatives. The President is now preparing actively for a meeting of the heads of government in the Americas at the end of this year or the beginning of 1967. He has instructed officials working on the N.A.T.O. problem in Washington to put aside the controversy over nuclear weapons for the time being and concentrate instead on new ways of improving consultation with the Atlantic allies in a revised alliance minus France.

Meanwhile, the President has held a series of private meetings with the staff of the National Security Council, the assistant secretaries of State and the secretaries of the military services in an effort to encourage them to come forward with new ideas and has urged them to make regular contact with the foreign policy experts in the universities and foundations for this same purpose. Reston continued :

If nothing else, this renewed interest in affairs apart from Vietnam has been well received in the Embassies here by diplomats who had begun to think that the United States was losing interest in everything except the war, and it has given foreign affairs officials in the Administration a sense of new beginnings to come.

Vietnam, of course, remains a major barrier to progress with the Communist nations But elsewhere Washington officials are hopeful that progress can be made.

They noted, for example, signs of a genuine settlement of the Indonesia-Malaysian

conflict, and feel that time Is working against most of the political leaders who have sought to expand their Influence beyond their own national borders. Sukarno in Indonesia, Nkrumah in Ghana, and Ben Bella in Algeria have all run into serious trouble by overreaching their political authority. Nasser’s dream of an Arab coalition under his leadership has not been realised.

And Castro, in Cuba, Is finding that his capacity to export his revolution in this hemisphere Is much more limited than he imagined. When officials in Washington do look beyond Vietnam, therefore, they think they see possibilities of development and co-operation, but all this still represent* a change of attitude in Washington rather than any major change in policy.