European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - May 30, 1977, Darmstadt, Hesse Pago 12 the stars and stripes monday May 30, 1977 James Reston ambassador Young is defying president s spirit of Compromise i r i to Ukwu Ever 6et tothe Emp of to turf Andrew Young the us ambassador to the United nations has emerged As the most talkative and controversial member of president Carter s Cabinet. Also the most aggressive and consistent. Seldom a Day goes by that he does t make the headlines with some vivid criticism of some country including his own about Tow they Are being beastly to his fellow , he has been wandering around Africa lecturing Ian Smith of Rhodesia and prime minister John Vorster of South Africa on the sins of White minority Rule. Passing through London. Ire condemns the old British colonial assumptions and coming Back he suggests that the swedes Are Liberal but re about As Liberal with the Blacks As the Whites Are in the Queens Borough of new York thereby infuriating the political leaders in both Sweden and is immune to Andy Young s criticism Mil even the Carter administration. When he came Back through i Inion from Africa and was asked what he thought about the cubans sending military advis ors to Ethiopia he said that the state department had denounced this intervention he supposed he said ironically that he ought to do the same but maybe Cuba s intervention Ould be a go xxx thing might even save some president Carter was asked at his latest press conference Why he fired maj. Gen John Singlaub for speaking out against the withdrawal of american ground troops in South Korea but tolerated Andy Young s dissents from official policy the president replied. Well. I know of no instance when Andy Young has violated the policy described the truth is thai Andy Young is doing what he Damn Well pleases he is going beyond even defying Carter s spirit of Compromise lie is irritating the Allie while Carter is trying to win their i Zipera lion lie is infuriating the Congress precisely when Carter is trying to work outcome kind of consensus at Home and is even pit King fights with the swedes of All people by suggesting that they Are terrible and while Jimmy Carter keeps supporting him. His state department is appalled by Young s antics and the rest of his Cabinet wonders what the president would think if they popped off All Over the world like Andy Short the main criticism Here is not of Young but of Carter. The president knows Young very Well better than any body else in Washington. Young wanted this Job at the United nations More than any other and As the most articulate and attractive Black in Carter s presidential Campaign he got it. But Young is Mil acting like a . Ambassador to the United nations. He is acting instead like an ambassador of the United slates to Africa and even like an ambassador of Tilvik Africa to washing ton you can talk to him at length about ills Job. But he Seldom mentions tins country s problems with Canada. Ulitin America. Europe. Asia the soviet Union. China or Japan. As a Southern politician he used to complain with great eloquence that the North could Only hunk but now he Only seems to think Black " Andy Young is nol the first prominent politician who has held this Job As us. Ambassador to the United nations living in the . Embassy in the Waldorf towers and flying Down on the shuttle to sit in on Cabinet meetings in the White House. Eisenhower nominated Henry Cabot Lodge for the Job Kennedy sent Adlai Ste Venson to the to get rid of him. John son diverted Arthur Goldberg from the supreme court into the . And Pat Moy Nihan was the first ambassador against rather than to the United nations. But Andy Young is something quite different. He is using the . As a platform for his own views of the racial conflicts of the world and More than All the other . Ambassadors in Liat Job. Or even More than any other member of Jimmy Carter s Cabi Nethe has a powerful political constituency supporting him Carter could fire any other member of his Cabinet without losing any major body of voters but Young has the Blacks on his Side. If he were a congressman or a columnist or a propagandist nobody could object to the ardent violence of his thought even if he were an assistant to the presi Dent arguing his racial philosophy but As an ambassador to the United nations flying around the world lecturing everybody on their moral duties this is some thing new in the history of politics and diplomacy and the for this is not Andy Young s but the president s. Young made Clear to the president from the Start what he intended to do. And he has done it. He s not an ambassador or even a faithful reporter of Jimmy Carter s human rights policies but a Brilliant propagandist and even a provocateur for his own views of the racial conflict William Frost failed to probe a vital Point the final hour and one half with Richard Nixon was disappointing primarily in its failure to gel from him his Esti mate of the bearing of watergate on the loss of Indochina it is very perplexing that David Frost did not Bear Down on the Point. Here was Richard Nixon claiming All kinds of immunity for himself in virtue of the exigencies of War. But failing to probe his own contribution to the failure of a a Lional s summary is As follows the democrats began a War which they declined to consummate. A Republican administration was voted into Power. Rather than help that administration Complete the task bequeathed to it. Critical members of the democratic family did everything they could do to undermine what should have been a National rather than a factional Effort. The Symbol of the opponents was Thixon Orrin the i Daniel Ellsberg. I pause to remark that i thought or. Nixon s referring to him As a Punk was As refreshing As Mountain water and i Hope judge Byrne out in los Angeles can be discouraged from ruling or. Nixon s statement As out of order. I Nixon s new approach consisted in intensifying pressures on the Field and diplomatically on the russians. His principal obstacle during those years was precisely the conviction in North Vietnam that Nixon s efforts would fail because of the strength of the Domestic opposition. But when Nixon was reelected by the landslide of 1972 and ordered the december bomb columns comments Ings finally the North vietnamese caved in we be decided that president Nixon is not going to be affected by the he tells us be due Tho advised Henry kiss Inger in january. 1973. When they got Down to working out an agreement. But what then happened in no time at All the North vietnamese conquered South Vietnam. Nixon is the King who had lost a War. But about this he said virtually Noth ing at All. We Are All supposed to know the official Story. The Guu of Tonkin Resolution was repealed the president was stripped of authority to carry out aggressive missions in defense of the terms of the treaty Congress turned niggardly in sup plying South Vietnam with arms no on seemed to care that the North was indifferent to the obligations of the treaty. The political reality was watergate Richard Nixon returned triumphantly to the White House was a slave to watergate whereas under Normal circumstances he might have exercised his recons Bililies As president and demanded of Congress a consistency of performance he was in Stead beginning his dreary Retreat from Victory. Having asked the nation to under write the awful sacrifices of Vietnam he was himself unwilling to risk the Humilia Tion of revealing the complicity of his staff in the watergate venture. By the end of 1973, Richard Nixon was far gone in solipsism. Vietnam had lost its strategic reality. In saying that perhaps he was the last casualty in Vietnam he showed an awesome callousness. The last casualty of Vietnam is Vietnam. As Richard Reeves said the other Day it is probably inevitable that no matter now often one takes the pledge not to write again on the desolate and sad subject of Richard Nixon it is bound to happen again and again. Next year his Book will be out. And an endless succession of books. Nixon is the Central figure in american postwar politics who ran five times on a National ticket and grew progressively in insecurity. Charles Colson records the utter listlessness of Nixon s behaviour on the night he was triumphantly reflected in 1972. And Frost elicits from him the bitter Humilia Tion Nixon Felt on not having been i invited Back to the White House notwithstanding that he had been vice president of the United states for eight Long years under Kennedy and Johnson t he old not reflect that Eisenhower banned Truman from the White House for eight years. I one shrinks from the use of a psychological vocabulary particularly at the expense of or. Nixon but in the end it is irresistible. He had and has a death wish. The huge efforts to slay alive politically had in the end Only a mechanical mean ing
