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World War, Cold War and the House of Dulles DULLES: a Biography Of

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World War, Cold War and the House of Dulles DULLES: a Biography Of World War, Cold War and the House of Dulles DULLES: A Biography of Elea- nor, Allen and John Foster Dul- les and Their. Family Network. Dialllanies Vade. 530 pp. $12.95 By DANIEL YERGIN ITHER John Foster Dulles did not E make himself clear, or was delib- erately misleading—or an emotionally overwrought Anthony Eden misunder- stood. Whatever the case, Eden was, on August 2, 1956, so grateful to Dulles that he told him that he would go down in history as a great foreign min- ister. "You know, nobody knows and no- body's going to know really for at least ' twenty-five years, the reason being that all the returns aren't in," Dulles said afterwards. "And for this same reason, nobody knows whether- I'm doing a good job or a bad job." Shortly after, of course, Eden came to believe that Dulles was a very bad foreign minister indeed. For he had thought Dulles had promised Ameri- can support to the Anglo-French Suez expedition. Instead, the United States led the condemnation in the United Nations—after having set in motion the events that had led Nasser to seize the Suez Canal in the first place. But now more than a quarter century has passed since Dulles became secretary Ziturtratian by Pay Driver for The %Unerring= Poet of state, and some perspective is possi- sister Eleanor. His analysis and judg-. ers. Mosley, the author of 25 or so DANIEL YERGIN Is the author of ble. ments, such as they are, are embedded hooks, is a fluent writer. In Dulles, he Shattered Peace: The Origins of The Leonard Mosley undertakes to pro- in his fast-moving narrative. But this is offers a social history, really a family Cold War and The National Security vide it in the form of a joint biography an enjoyable book that one reads pri- history, of American foreign policy State. of Foster with his brother Allen and marily for the story and the charact- from the First World War into the 1960s, with a goodly offering of the Indeed, Mosley's book is so struc- kind of gossip that is conventionally tured and so populated with vivid per- described as spicy. sonalities that any television mogul Mosley's real skills are as a narrator. with a minimum degree of intelligence As in a novel, characters appear and would recognize the potential here for reappear. One is Noel Field, first intro- a superb 10-part mini-series, a sort of duced at age 12, when Allen Dulles Upstairs, Upstairs. met him in Switzerland. When Dulles But what of the protagonists them- asked the boy about his ambition, selves? The Dulles siblings came from Field replied, "Bring peace to the a family of missionaries and diplomats. world." A world war later, back in A grandfather add uncle had both Switzerland, Field, by then a secret been secretaries of state, and Foster communist, managed to insinuate him- seemed predestined_ himself for the self with and use Dulles, who was the job. He served with Keynes and Mon- OSS station chief. Revenge came in net on the reparations commission at 1949, when the CIA managed to pass Versailles, then went back to New the word eastward that Field was a York and corporate law at Sullivan CIA agent (which he was not), and so and Cromwell. In the late 1930s, bored set in motion the great Stalinist purges and restless, with legal success, he in Eastern Europe. turned his attention back to inter- Another ominous character who national politics, and began maneuver- moves through these pages is Kim ing in such a way that he was soon the Philby, who as the Washington liaison Republicans' chief foreign policy between British and American intelli- spokesman. But it was not until he was gence in the late 1940s proved to be 65 that he became secretary of state_ one of the Soviet Union's most useful Of Dulles' two great achievements in spies ever. Philby, now living in foreign policy, one predated his secre- Moscow on a KGB stipend, has the last tary of stateship. This was his central word, of a sort, in a 1976-1977 corre- role in shaping the Japanese peace spondence with Mosley, published as treaty, which laid the basis for Ameri- an extensive appendix. Philby is really ca's close relation with modern Japan. quite condescending in his Judgments Equally important was his role after on America's former foremost spy, de- becoming secretary in cementing scribing Allen Dulles as "bumbling," American relations with the Federal "lazy," and guilty of "compulsive re- Republic of Germany. sort to cliche." That impression, Mos- There was much else that was ques- ley argues, was a deliberate act, for tionable—the failure to respond posi- Dulles was actually on to Phil by's tively to the opportunity provided by tricks, and came close to nabbing him. Stalin's death in 1953, and the confu- (Phitby's correspondence is interesting sion and mishaps involved in the en- not only for what he says, but also for tire Suez affair. One cannot help but the tone—ironic, self-satisfied, smug, wonder what difference it would have and filled with a scorn for Americans made had the 1956 Hungarian Revolu- that may well cloak a resentment which partly explains his treachery.) ----(Continued on page G4) tional danger diffused any trouble- some questions about the CIA's power BOOK WORLD/MARCH 26. 11973 and role and independence. But the or- ganization probably grew too fast and in too many directions so that Allen, never a particularly good administra- tor, had increasing difficulty in main- Dulles taining control. If Foster's career culminated in anti- climax, then Allen's ended in humilia- (Continued from page G1)---- tion, in the form of two episodes of tion not occurred at the same time as overreaching that brought him down. Suez. Perhaps the real truth about Dul- The first was the U-2 affair; the sec- les' years as secretary were that they ond, the Bay of Pigs, in which, Mosley were an anticlimax, that despite the suggests, Allen and the CIA were made rhetoric, and the partisan differences, the scapegoats for other's failures. But they pretty much continued where as a nation, we still have no clear con- Acheson and Co. had left off. Dulles sensus on the question that was cen- himself seemed to recognize this. "You tral to Allen's public life, the wig of know, Paul," Mosley quotes him as say- the intelligence community in a demo- ing to Paul Nitze, "I really don't disa- cratic society. gree at all with the Acheson Eleanor's story is somewhat differ- policies... I'm in general agree- ent. Early on, Mosley declares: "During ment" The real balance of forces and all but the final months of the Eisen- interests, not rhetoric about rollback hower era it was the Dulles family and liberation, determined U.S. for- which managed and manipulated the eign policy. - foreign affairs of the United States, While Foster is the dominating prep.-• and, in consequence, decisively in- mice in the book, just as he apparently fluenced the rest of the world"—Fos- dominated his siblings, Allen and Elea- ter at State, Allen at the CIA, Eleanor nor emerge from the book as more on the Berlin desk in State. But this, it human characters. For Allen, the craft seems, is somewhat misleading. Allen of intelligence was a passion, and this and Foster were certainly a team— charming, engaging, manipulative per- their only major disagreement being son brought even more energy to it in the late 1830s on the dangers posed than (according to Mosley) he did to his by Hitler (Foster was complacent). energetic pursuit of attractive women. Allen's story is really the story of the development of America's intelligence apparatus. As we continue to learn today, there Is considerable uncer- tainty about the relations of intelli- gence and covert activities to our sort of political system. It was Henry Stim- Even so, the book does not really de- son who, decades ago, opposed coun- velop their relationship. Not at all terespionage on the grounds that gent- clear is how they interacted with each lemen do not read other gentlemen's other, nor what the significance was of mail. At the time of the planning for this sibling suzerainty at State and the the Bay of Pigs, Dean Rusk bad a cer- CIA. Mosley's psychologizing about the tain distrust for Allen Dulles for that effects on Allen of being born with a very reason—because be had. discov- club foot lcorrected while he was still ered that the CIA had taken to open- an infant) is not particularly convinc- ing the private mail of the Rockefeller ing. Foundation during the period that The relationship of Eleanor to her Rusk was at its head. Yet it is also true two brothers is even murkier. It is very that nations do compete with each hard to understand how her life inter- other, and, it can hardly be in a na- sected with theirs. What seems to have tion's long-term interests to pretend characterized Eleanor was her reso- otherwise. lute independence. She does not ap- Allen did more than anybody else to pear to have been part of the Dulles shape the CIA into a powerful, for- team. Hers is the story of a very intelli- midable, broad-ranging, independent gent, intellectual, capable, forthright organization. And for a time, he him- woman, trying to find her own path self was riding high, very high.
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