AMBASSADOR AT LARGE: DIPLOMAT EXTRAORDINARY AMBASSADOR AT LARGE: DIPLOMAT EXTRAORDINARY

by

LEE H. BURKE

MARTINUS NI]HOFF• I THE HAGUE I I972 © I972 by Martinus Nijholl, The Hague, Netherlands All rights reserved, including the right to translate or to reproduce this book or parts thereof in any form ISBN 978-94-015-0008-1 ISBN 978-94-015-0466-9 (eBook) DOl 10.1007/978-94-015-0466-9 FOREWORD

A mbassador at Large: Diplomat Extraordinary is a welcome contri• bution to the literature on contemporary diplomacy, and is especially relevant to the conduct of United States foreign relations. Concomitant with pressures to escalate the level of diplomatic representation and negotiation, the Ambassador at Large, a recent innovation in the American diplomatic hierarchy, may play an increasingly important role. Should other governments follow the American lead by creating similar offices, a new, flexible layer of diplomatic relations may be added to the four which currently are most widely used, namely, the summit, the ministerial, the traditional professional, and the technical strata. Diplomacy may be defined as the international political process whereby political entities - mostly the recognized members of the fami• ly of nations, but also emergent states, international and supranational organizations, and a few special entities like the Vatican - conduct their official relations with one another in the international environ• ment. Like other human and societal processes, it is astatic and in the course of time experiences significant changes. It has expanded to meet the needs of a rapidly proliferating community of nations and it has been adapted to the growing complex of international concerns and interactions. Scientific and technological changes have created new problems and revolutionized methods of diplomatic communication and transportation. These developments have both intensified the needs and enriched the potentialities of the diplomatic process. Throughout history doubtless each major, permeative modification in diplomatic practice has produced a so-called "new diplomacy." In The Evolution of Diplomatic Method (I954), Sir Harold Nicolson dis• tinguishes sequentially among the Greek, Roman, Italian (fifteenth and sixteenth centuries), French (seventeenth to nineteenth centuries), VI FOREWORD and American (twentieth century) basic systems of diplomacy. The last of these - the American method - he avows, is characterized by in• creased parliamentary diplomacy in the international organization, open diplomacy as espoused by Woodrow Wilson, and personal di• plomacy involving the active participation of political principals. While none of these qualities was entirely new at the time of World War I, at least not to the United States, they have come to be far more widely employed and institutionally more highly sophisticated. Since the British diplomatist addressed himself to the subject, the new diplomacy has taken on additional qualities, and some of its chief characteristics have been refined. Thus, "personal" has needed to be distinguished from "personalized" diplomacy, in many ways the diplo• matic process has become more democratic, ministerial and summit diplomacy have come to be relied on more frequently and in an in• creasing variety of forms and forums, and the personnel of the diplo• matic profession has undergone modification. One such change, re• sulting in an important, innovated type of diplomatic emissary is de• scribed, assessed, and related to other categories of diplomats in this volume on the A mbassador at Large: Diplomat Extraordinary. Interest in, and English language literature on, diplomatic relations expanded both quantitatively and qualitatively to a remarkable degree following World War II. As was to be anticipated, however, the nature of such growth and the directions of its emphases were neither broadly planned nor systematically executed. Supplementing a modest library of standard, broad-scale textual materials, hundreds of monographic studies and essays have focused more particularly on a small number of central functional issues or key agents and institutions in the foreign relations process - such as the Presidency, the Secretary and De• partment of State, the Foreign Service, policy-making, and top-level interagency coordination (including the operation of the National Se• curity Council system). Equally generous literary attention has been devoted to the roles in the external affairs arena played by decision-making, the information media and public opinion, elites and pressure groups, the military, and the intelligence community. These have complemented some of the older areas of concentration, such as treaty-making and the diplomatic contribution to peace-making and the amicable settlement of inter• national disputes. The last of these, however, has come to be refocused as "problem solving," "conflict resolution," and "crisis management" - which are evoking their own emergent literature. FOREWORD VII

Despite such developments, however, in the United States the princi• pal literary expansion since 1945 has centered upon three types of ma• terials. The first of these, understandably attractive to both authors and readers, concerns the making and substantive nature of foreign policy, with primary emphasis on policy essence rather than diplomatic practitioners and techniques of implementation. Second, also of wide• spread interest is that literature which simply chronicles the concerns of the United States with particular foreign relations developments, both areal and functional. This category of literature - often in the guise of diplomatic history - also embraces several hundred volumes which may be loosely described as "case studies" of American policy and action in selected sets of international circumstances. The third category consists of the rich reservoir of autobiographies, biographies, memoirs, and commentaries by and about Presidents, Secretaries of State, diplomats, consuls, and other officials engaged in foreign affairs. It goes without saying that much of this literature contributes sub• stantially to understanding the complex relations of states and certain aspects of the manner in which they deal with one another. N everthe• less, literature emphasizing and analyzing diplomacy per se as the process whereby governments mutually conduct their official relations, studies applying the "diplomatic" rather than some other perspective (such as the historical, personal, administrative, partisan, or personnel service approaches) to foreign relations matters, and studies of varying types of diplomatic agents have, by comparison, been largely neglected. Admittedly, in the past the literature has been enriched by the writings of such eminent European diplomatists as Fran<;oise de Callieres, Jules M. Cambon, Lord Maurice P. Hanky, Jules Jusserand, Otto Krauske, Paul L. E. Pradier-Fodere, Sir Harold Nicolson, Sir Ernest M. Satow, Lord Robert G. Vansittart, and many others. Aside from the analysis of policy-making and the substance of foreign policy, together with the "I-Was-There-When" type of memoir, as al• ready noted, the broad-scale study of diplomacy as a profession is rela• tively rare in contemporary American literature. To be sure, since World War II several writers have concentrated on the principal prac• titioners, including, for example, James Aldridge (The Diplomat, 1950), Gordon A. Craig and Felix Gilbert (The Diplomats, I9I9-I939, 1953), Charles W. Thayer (Diplomat, 1959), E. Wilder Spaulding (Ambassa• dors Ordinary and Extraordinary, 1961), and John Ensor Harr (The Professional Diplomat, 1969). A few have written descriptively, analyti• cally, conceptualistically, and normatively about diplomacy as an insti- VIII FOREWORD tution or function, illustrated by the contributions of Stephen D. Kertesz (American Diplomacy in a New Era, 1961), Graham H. Stuart (American Diplomatic and Consular Practice, 2nd ed., 1952), Kenneth W. Thompson (American Diplomacy and Emergent Patterns, 1962), and Henry M. Wriston (Diplomacy in a Democracy, 1956). Still others have written on negotiation and negotiating style, international conferencing, privileges and immunities, and other more restricted aspects of the diplomatic process. Similarly, systematic studies of particular categories of United States ranking diplomats and other officials engaged in foreign relations ac• tivities are equally rare. While E. Wilder Spaulding draws some dis• tinctions among various types of ambassadors, ranging from the "old masters" to "the female of the species," and from academicians and "men of letters" to "the pros," he tends to be more attentive to dis• tinguishing emissaries on the basis of their background than of their pragmatic functioning. A number of other writers have chosen to ad• dress themselves to several limited categories of emissaries. For ex• ample, Charles O. Paullin describes the Diplomatic Negotiations of American Naval Officers (1912), Henry M. Wriston deals with Executive Agents in American Foreign Relations (1929), Maurice Waters surveys the activities of The Ad Hoc Diplomat (1963), and Alfred Vagts reviews the functions of The Military Attache (1967). The first three of these are concerned largely with American usage, whereas Vagts does not delimit himself to United States practice. This relatively meager English-language literary fare suggests the urgent need for planned augmentation for the comprehensive under• standing of the diplomatic process today. Serious studies of a good many additional types of specialized diplomatic functionaries is needed - such as the national permanent representatives to various inter• national organizations (including the chiefs of mission to the United Nations, the Organization of American States, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and others), national "observer representatives" to international organizations, various specialized attaches (concerned with agricultural, commercial, cultural, financial, labor, scientific, and other affairs), international organization negotiatory and observer representatives to national governments and other international organ• izations, international conference chairmen as well as national dele• gation chairmen and secretariat chiefs, diplomatic mission protocolary officers, and several categories of presidential special agents (including roving envoys, "trouble-shooters," and special resident emissaries, (like FOREWORD IX

Myron Taylor's mission to the Vatican during and after World War II). It is to this literary need for additional study of particular categories of diplomatic emissaries, and also to reflect the United States response to changes inherent in the new diplomatic method, that this study of the A mbassador at Large: Diplomat Extraordinary is addressed. As its author notes, this diplomatic office was only created by the United States government after World War II, and in certain respects may still be considered as experimental. The office was established to provide a diplomatic agent on a continuing basis to serve at a high level - sometimes the highest - while, at the same time, its incumbent re• mains available for use in any diplomatic forum and capacity in which he might be needed, rather than being restricted to either a particular Department of State or a resident mission post. Appointees, therefore, supplement both the regularly accredited traditional diplomats and the frequently employed presidential special envoys ("secret agents"). While their appointment is of a continuing nature, their assignments often may be ad hoc. This volume addresses itself to the establishment of the office of Ambassador at Large, it examines in some depth the background and performance of those who have held it, it analyzes the essence, the development, and the potentialities of the office, and it relates the Am• bassador at Large to other types of emissaries in terms of both the operation of the appointment process under the United States consti• tutional system and the functioning of the incumbent. It assesses the flexibility of the office and scrutinizes the special qualities of past incumbents, such as mobility, experience if not expertise, and cen• trality, as well as the advantages that inhere, including a high-level, independent perspective and a significant voice in diplomacy. The volume compares past incumbents on the basis of personal qualifi• cations, reasons for appointment, nature of service, and level of oper• ation. Most important, it contemplates the future of the office. Students of the diplomatic process should welcome this digression from the widespread attention paid to the professional Foreign Service corps of the United States, which seems to be constantly under official and literary review, and they will find this volume a genuine if not also a refreshing contribution to an important but underdeveloped litera• ture. Perhaps this volume will also encourage others to concentrate with equal perception, penetration, and clarity on the study of those additional specialized types of diplomatic emissaries who contribute materially to the changing fabric of contemporary diplomatic practice. ELMER PLISCHKE PREFACE

Shortly after World War II the United States introduced a new diplo• matic office - the Ambassador at Large. Although some individual presidential personal emissaries had previously been referred to as Ambassador at Large, it was not until I949 that an office by this title was officially institutionalized. Initially, the office was established as a result of the Hoover Com• mission's recommendation. Investigating the Executive branch of the government, one of the problems gaining the attention of the Com• mission concerned the many international conferences attended by the Secretary of State, requiring long and frequent absences from the Department of State. To help remedy this situation, the Commission recommended that the Secretary of State be given "assistants" who could help him in important international negotiations as well as attend important conferences abroad when an experienced representa• tive of high rank was required. From this inception, the office of Ambassador at Large has been variously used for appointments ranging from those whom the Presi• dent and Secretary of State intend to use as their special personal representatives in critical situations to those for whom the office served more as a convenient position for an official who could not at the time more easily fill another appointment. This does not deny the importance or usefulness of the Ambassadorship at Large, but points to the ambiguity of the office and the fact that its functions are perceived differently due to the lack of specification of duty and, perhaps, a lack of awareness of its potential. This presentation seeks at least partially to fill the gap in the litera- PREFACE XI

ture on the subject of Ambassador at Large. The approach taken is an analytical examination of the office by reviewing the use of the Am• bassador at Large since World War II. Each of the personages who held the office of Ambassador at Large has left his imprint upon it, and examination of their experiences offers opportunity to illuminate the essence and problems of the office. Therefore, the case study method is used. Providing a convenient analytical framework, each case is examined in terms of concepts of the office, background and appointment of the Ambassador at Large, his functions, and his level of operation. Finally, attention is devoted to the potential of the office. The underlying proposition is that effective employment of the office of Ambassador at Large could alleviate some of the criticisms directed toward the President's widespread use of the special personal diplomatic emissary, while at the same time embodying the stated advantages. Moreover, the Ambassador at Large could serve to assist the Secretary of State. He could be an individual with experience and proven capability, and without political ambitions. He could be appointed with the confir• mation of the Senate as a personal representative of the President with full negotiating powers, and in a continuing capacity. He could not only enjoy the confidence of the President but also foreign chiefs of state and heads of government to whom he might be sent. As a regu• larized appointee he could be enmeshed into and accepted as a part of the established diplomatic process. More than one Ambassador at Large at a time with functional or area specialties could be employed to offset a main criticism of this office - that it prevents the utilization of specialized talents of a number of individuals. Such a procedure has the advantage of stabilizing practice rather than producing a new emissary for each problem, or a new emissary for each mission. At the same time, the President would not be deprived of his own personal agents for special diplomatic missions. The record of two decades of development and change provides a basis for study. But the past affords every reason to believe that the office will be subject to further development and redefinition in the course of time. In addition to the intellectual and practical need to seek under• standing of the office of Ambassador at Large, my interest in this sub• ject was fired by my mentor, Professor Elmer Plischke. I am also indebted to him for his editorial suggestions, advice, and sometimes differences of view which have contributed to this study. XII PREFACE

I am greatly indebted to all of those who assisted me in the prepa• ration of the manuscript, particularly the Ambassadors at Large themselves, and other Department of State personnel, who provided useful information in interviews and correspondence. Research and writing were conducted prior to the commencement of my employment with the Department of State Historical Office and do not reflect access to privileged information. The interpretation and conclusions herein are my own and are not to be construed as an expression of of• ficial Department of State policy. As always, my family shared my interest and enthusiasm and provided the quiet encouragement that made the task more pleasant. LEE H. BURKE Washington, D.C. October, I97I Philip C. Jessup I I VV.Averell Harriman IH

Chester Bowles 1---1

Llewellyn E. Thompson

Ellsworth Bunker H

Henry Cabot Lodge H I George C. McGhee 1--+

David M. Kennedy l- I I President Truman Eisenhower I Kennedy I Johnson Nixon I I I Secretary of State Acheson Dulles I Herter I Rusk Rogers I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I J I I I I 1949 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 656 67 68 69 70 71

~ .... Fig. I. The Ambassadors at Large...... XIV

TABLE I. THE AMBASSADORS AT LARGE Ambassadors at Large Date Date Date Nominated Confirmed Terminated

Philip C. Jessup Feb. 10, 1949 Mar. 1, 1949 Jan. 19, 1953 W. Averell Harriman Jan. 30, 1961 Feb. 6, 1961 Dec. 3, 196 1 W . Averell Harriman Feb. 19, 1965 Mar. 9, 1965 Jan. 20, 1969 Chester Bowles 1 Jan. 15, 1962 Jan. 29, 1962 June 9,1963 Llewellyn E. Thompson Sept. 24, 1962 Oct. 2, 1962 Dec. 26, 1966 Ellsworth Bunker Oct. 7, 1966 Oct. 12, 1966 April II, 1967 Henry Cabot Lodge Mar. 22, 1967 April 5, 1967 May 7, 1968 George C. McGhee April 2, 1968 April 19, 1968 Mar. 15, 1969 David M. Kennedy Dec. 14, 1970 Feb. II, 1971

1 Bowles was given an interim appointment, Dec. I, 1961.

TABLE 2. PRESIDENTS AND SECRETARIES OF STATE President Political Secretary of State Dates of Service Party From To

Truman Dem. Dean Acheson Jan. 21, 1949 Jan. 20, 1953 Eisenhower Rep. John Foster Dulles Jan. 21, 1953 April 16, 1959 Christian A. Herter April 22, 1959 Jan. 20, 1961 Kennedy Dem. Dean Rusk Jan. 21, 1961 Johnson Dem. Dean Rusk Jan. 20, 1969 Nixon Rep. William P. Rogers Jan. 21, 1969 TABLE OF CONTENTS

FOREWORD v

PREFACE X

CHAPTER I. The Idea for the Office I Presidental Personal Emissary I Definition 4 Presidential Appointment of Special Emissaries 5 Functions 8 Department of State Reorganization 10 Synthesis - Norman H. Davis 14

CHAPTER II. The Office Established -Philip C. Jessup: Secretary of State Deputy 20 Appointment 20 Functions 29 United Nations 29 Foreign Ministers' Meetings 32 Department of State Duties 41 Resignation 49

CHAPTER III. The Office Expanded- W. Averell Harriman: High-Level Roving Ambassador 51 First Appointment as Ambassador at Large - 1961 58 Second Appointment as Ambassador at Large - 1965 60 Functions 61 Roving Emissary 61 Ad Hoc Missions 66 Conference Delegate 69 Department of State Duties 76 Conclusion 77

CHAPTER IV. The Office as Expedient - Chester Bowles and David M. Kennedy: Presidential Advisers 82 Chester Bowles 82 Appointment 83 Functions 87 Conclusion 93 David M. Kennedy 94 Appointment 94 Functions 96 Conclusion 97 XVI TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER v. The Office as an Interim Post - Llewellyn E. Thompson, Ellsworth Bunker, Henry Cabot Lodge, George C. McGhee: Area Specialists 99 Llewellyn E. Thompson 100 Functions 102 Ellsworth Bunker 106 Functions 107 Henry Cabot Lodge 108 Functions 109 George C. McGhee 110 Functions 110 Conclusion I I I

CHAPTER VI. The Ambassador at Large - Past and Future 113 Background I 13 Concepts of the Office 116 Appointment Process 122 Functions 123 Roving Emissary 124 Ad Hoc Missions 125 Conference Delegate 127 Presidential Adviser 128 Secretary of State Deputy 129 Department of State Duties 130 Summary 133 Level of Operation 133 Conclusion 136

ApPENDIX A. Background Sketch 0/ Ambassadors at Large 141 ApPENDIX B. Principal Publications 0/ A mbassadors at Large 147 ApPENDIX C. Summary 0/ Activities 0/ Ambassadors at Large 148 ApPENDIX D. Foreign Travel by Secretary 0/ State Dean Rusk 154

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY 158

INDEX 169

LIST OF TABLES Table Page I. The Ambassadors at Large XIV II. Presidents and Secretaries of State XIV III. Summary of Background and Experience 114 IV. Appointment 121 V. General Categories of Functions 124

LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page I. The Ambassadors at Large Xln