Brouhaha at Foreign Affairs

If it were not in such an important teapot, the argument would be a tiny tempest indeed, a disagreement among a small group of men over the editorship of a publication that sells slightly more than 70,000 copies every three months. But the publication is Foreign Affairs--the most prestigious journal of its kind in the world. And the quarrel is a family matter for a major segment of the nation's intellectual and political Establishment--the nearly 1,500 members of the Council on Foreign Relations.

The trouble began brewing in March with the announcement that William Bundy, 54, a former Kennedy and Johnson official who was a key figure in the escalation of the Viet Nam War, had been named to replace Hamilton Fish Armstrong as editor of Foreign Affairs. Under Armstrong's evenhanded direction over the past 49 years, the quarterly has been a barometer of American foreign policy thinking. Its contributors have proposed, analyzed and, in many instances, carried out U.S. diplomacy. Its subscription list is a Who's Who of academic and political leaders around the world. Lenin is said to have read and underlined the first issue, and when Nikita Khrushchev wanted to signal a thaw in the cold war, he did so in an article in Foreign Affairs.

Illegal Policies. Bundy's selection for the coveted editorship was greeted with dismay by some members of the council, chiefly antiwar academics who believed that his part in America's most disastrous foreign adventure made him a poor choice for the editorship. Led by Richard Falk, professor of international law and practice at Princeton, the dissidents lodged a protest with David Rockefeller, chairman of the council board. Said Falk: "Mr. Bundy's role in planning and executing illegal and criminal war policies in Indochina should disqualify him, at least for a period of years, from holding an editorial position of this kind. To reward a former governmental official who was deceitful toward the public and Congress in this way directly contradicts the entire Nurnberg tradition."

It was an ungentlemanly complaint about one of their own, but the gentlemen of the Establishment rallied round. A review of the appointment was quietly undertaken. Some members of the council expressed reservations, but insisted that once proffered, the offer should not be rescinded. George Ball, the most persistent high-ranking dove within the Johnson Administration, came to the defense of his onetime adversary. Said Ball: "I am appalled by the McCarthyism of the left that is going on here. If we're going to go into this sort of personal denunciation, we're going to go through a very ugly period in American history."

Several members insisted that such condemnation had already been the fate of former Secretary of State Dean Rusk, now a professor of international law at the University of Georgia, and former National Security Affairs Adviser Walt Rostow, whose professorship at M.I.T. was lost after his White House years. Said one council member: "Let's face it, it was a spineless, disgusting spectacle on the part of the intelligentsia. Rusk and Rostow were brutally punished for what they believed to be right, precisely by the people who have sonorously argued for diverse views and the freedom to express them. It's nothing to be proud of, and let's not now make the same mistake."

Grotesque Charge. Bundy traveled down to Princeton for a meeting with Falk, some would say to allay his objections. Bundy insists, however, that the meeting was simply "to get to know someone I was interested in." Although the meeting was cordial, Falk and his supporters did not give up their opposition. Says Bundy of Viet Nam and his troubled appointment: "Obviously the returns in Viet Nam are tragic--tragic at home and tragic in Viet Nam. There has been tragic bloodshed--no worse than Korea, but there it is. I think it certainly can be argued that the war was a mistake. I have every hope that this thing will be thought through by people."

Francis Bator, professor of political economy at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government, agreed: "I happen to think that Bill Bundy will be a first-rate editor. But more important, I think an issue of high principle is involved. An honorable public servant has been charged with being a war criminal. That charge is grotesque. It reflects a tawdry moralizing approach to foreign policy that is deeply dangerous. Backing away from a decision in the face of such a charge would have been a disaster for the council."

Bundy's appointment was reconfirmed by the board in a five-page memorandum sent by Rockefeller to all council members. Falk and the other opponents of the appointment, however, have not given up. They hope to carry the issue of Bundy's fitness for the job to the full membership.

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