Without Gimmicks

STRATEGY Without Gimmicks When a presidential committee headed by Investment Banker William H. Jackson began to study U.S. psychological warfare five months ago, critics feared that the Eisenhower Administration was looking for trick solutions to complex international problems. Last week the White House published a summary of the nonsecret portions of the Jackson Committee's final report. Far from looking for gimmicks, Jackson and his men had taken a highly cautious view of psychological warfare and had devoted much of their attention to methods of improving administration of the nation's cold-war effort.

The report proposed abolition of the ineffectual Psychological Strategy Board, which, the committee said, was "founded upon the misconception that 'psychological activities' and 'psychological strategy' somehow exist apart from official policies and actions . . ." To replace the purely advisory PSB, the committee recommended setting up an Operations Coordinating Board which would have the power to insure that all Government agencies conform to cold-war policies laid down by the National Security Council.

Critical of U.S. overseas information programs ("No single set of ideas has been registered abroad through effective repetition"), the committee endorsed the President's plan to consolidate in one agency the separate information services now operated by the International Information Administration, Mutual Security Agency and Technical Cooperation Administration. But it warned against the high-pressure huckster touch: "American broadcasts and printed materials should concentrate on objective, factual news reporting . . . The tone and content should be forceful and direct, but a propagandist note should be avoided."

Since the Jackson Committee included three key members of the Eisenhower Administration (Deputy Defense Secretary Roger Kyes, Presidential Assistants Robert Cutler and C. D. Jackson), its major recommendations were sure to win Administration approval.

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