‘Weakness For Exaggeration’

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31657, 18 April 1968, Page 9

‘Weakness For Exaggeration’

W.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) WASHINGTON, April 17. The Johnson Administration is in trouble again because of its tendency to promise more than it delivers. From the very first, it has shown a weakness for exaggeration, and this has blurred its record, even when its achievements and purposes were admirable, writes James Reston, of the “New York Times” News Service. Reston continues: Its record of social justice is a failure only when compared with its soaring rhetoric about creating a Great Society. Even on a budget limited by the war, it has been a compassionate administration with many historical developments to its credit, but its acts have never caught up with its words. Similarly, it was not satis-

fled to rally the nation to effective action in the slums. It had to proclaim a “war on poverty,” and it is in difficulty on this battlefield too, not because it did not make progress, but merely because the “war” turned out to be a skirmish. The latest embarrassment of this habit of overstatement is the present snarl over where to hold the peace talks on Vietnam.

Both sides are quibbling abou‘ where to meet, while the killing goes on, but the President is in a weak position simply because he has said over and over again that he would go “anywhere any time” if there were a prospect of useful discussions. This, obviously, raises awkward complications when he puts forward objections to talking in Warsaw, no matter how reasonable his objections may be.

For not only abroad but at home, he seems to be going back in his promises and niggling over technicalities while our casualties are mounting at the rate (on last official count) of 279 killed and 3190 wounded a week. In actual fact, the Administration’s objections to talk-

ing in Poland are not mere technicalities. For a few hours at least, the Administration was willing to negotiate there, but the South Vietnamese and the South Koreans, who have no embassies in Warsaw, objected, and particularly in the case of the South Vietnamese, Washington did not feel that it could go against the nation with the greatest stake in the war.

More than that the Johnson Administration was afraid that its concessions to bringing about peace talks were being misconstrued in Hanoi, and maybe elsewhere, as weakness, or what is worse as a policy decision to accept peace at almost any price. Not only in Hanoi but in Saigon there is a feeling that the replacement of Mr McNamara, the transfer of General Westmoreland, the retirement of President Johnson, plus the recent Communist offensive on the South Vietnamese cities, had led to a major shift in United States policy and maybe even to a decision to sue for peace. This, of course, is not the United States position, and Washington wishes to disabuse Hanoi of the illusion

by bargaining hard over where the peace talks should take place. There is another important factor in the Johnson Administration’s present position. It is obvious that the Government is still divided. In spte of its recent moves toward reducing the level of violence on the war, on the necessity and desirability of peace talks now. Influential officials such as the Secretary of State, Mr Rusk. General Westmoreland, the Ambassador. Mr Elsworth Bunker, and Mr Walt Rostow, are still arguing that the Communists are in much worse shape than the United States, and that the United States has more to gain by continuing the war than by agreeing to what it fears will be an unsatisfactory compromise peace. Nevertheless, it is harder for a democratic country to go on quibbling over where to talk after the President’s emphatic promises to “walk the last mile for peace” than it is for the Communists, who do not have the same concern for public support and therefore do not have to promise much to win the consent of their people.