Winging His Way into '78

The President's nine-day, 18,500-mile odyssey is heavy on symbolic acts

"This journey," said Jimmy Carter last week, "reflects the diversity of a rapidly changing world." If the President's expectations seemed modest, the itinerary for his trip was anything but. By late this week, he will have covered 18,500 miles in nine days, visiting at least seven countries along the way: Poland, Iran, India, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, France and Belgium.

This is the first leg of a presidential grand tour that will be resumed in March, when Carter visits Africa and South America. The four-continent odyssey originally was to have taken place in one installment last November, but it was postponed because Congress had not finished work on the energy bill. With the legislation still stalled in Congress, Carter decided to make the trip anyway, maintaining that this might somehow encourage a House-Senate conference committee to speed up work on the bill after its members return from vacation on Jan. 19.

While abroad, Carter talked about human rights, oil prices, Middle East peace and other matters of substance. But he put major emphasis on a series of symbolic acts that were intended to have broad significance. These acts, said National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, would demonstrate to the world that the Carter Administration, more than any of its predecessors, is trying to break out of old foreign policy molds, willing to deal equably with diversity abroad and genuinely committed to the cause of human rights. Having frequently demonstrated his skill with political symbolism at home, the President seemed to be trying his hand at the same game overseas. Apart from a possible upward blip in the popularity polls, however, he left home anticipating no heavy returns from this trip or the one in March. Said a senior U.S. official of the communiques that were being drafted for each stop: "They will be remembered for less time than it takes to write them."

Before leaving Washington, Carter tended to some last-minute domestic affairs. He nominated Businessman G. William Miller as Federal Reserve chairman and promoted James Mclntyre Jr. to Director of the Office of Management and Budget (see ECONOMY & BUSINESS). But Carter spent most of his time getting ready for his trip. Like any other tourist headed for Asia, he took pills to ward off malaria and was inoculated against cholera and typhoid. He pored over thick briefing books. He packed a copy of the Bhagavad Gita, a Hindu holy book.

Finally, bundled in an overcoat and scarf against an early-morning chill, he boarded Air Force One and began his journey, which will take him a third of the way around the world and into 1978. Accompanying him were 200 reporters, cameramen and TV technicians on two chase planes and an official party of 13 on the presidential jet, including Wife Rosalynn, Brzezinski, Secretary of State Cyrus Vance and his wife Grace.

First stop was Poland, which provided Carter with a Communist forum for reaffirming his stand on human rights. Polish Party Chief Edward Gierek, a former coal miner, warmly greeted the President at a remote area of Okecie Airport, but then slyly made a pre-emptive strike on his guest's issue. Said Gierek: "To the people of Poland, which has so dreadfully experienced the atrocities of war, security is the supreme value; while life and peace are the fundamental rights."

Carter in turn spoke fondly of the traditional ties between Poland and the U.S., but the welcoming party seemed oddly unresponsive-almost hostile. The problem was that the President's message had been badly mangled by Steven Seymour, a freelance interpreter from New York City, hired by the State Department at $150 a day for the Polish leg of Carter's trip. When Carter said he had come to learn about the Polish people's desires for the future, the translator used a Polish word meaning sexual desire. When the President said that he had left the U.S. that morning, the interpreter used a word meaning that he had abandoned the U.S. forever. Carter's praise of the Poles' much revered Constitution of May 3,1791, came across as if he were holding it up to ridicule. Seymour even substituted a few Russian words for Polish. Gierek and the welcoming party of about 300 Polish officials were alternately annoyed and amused; Seymour was demoted to translating only Polish into English for the rest of the visit.

Next day, when Rosalynn called on Catholic Primate Stefan Cardinal Wyszynski, a symbol of resistance to Communism, Polish-born Brzezinski did the translating. The President meantime laid a wreath at the Tomb of Poland's Unknown Soldier, as more than 500 people broke through police lines, shouting "Carter! Car-ter!" and "Niech zyje [long life]!" It was one of the few occasions when he had firsthand contact with ordinary Poles, many of whom regard him as a symbol of freedom because of his support for human rights. Later, when he placed flowers at the Nike (Greek for victory) monument to the Poles who died in a 1944 uprising against the Nazis and at the memorial to the Jews massacred in the Warsaw ghetto in 1943, police kept away all but a handful of official observers. The Polish government had tried to persuade Carter not to visit either site. The first is a painful reminder that Soviet troops could have intervened in the uprising but instead waited, just across the Vistula River, until Warsaw was leveled; the second recalls for many Poles the fact that anti-Semitism still exists in their country.

Joined by Brzezinski and Vance, Carter lunched with Gierek and other high-ranking Poles at the Sejm (parliament) building. For three hours and 45 minutes, they discussed stalled negotiations on troop reductions by NATO and the Warsaw Pact countries, Poland's complaints that U.S. antidumping regulations have unfairly hurt its exports and Carter's plea that more Poles be allowed to join their families in the U.S. Afterward Carter announced that the U.S. will provide Poland with $200 million in credits to buy food and feed grains-in addition to an earlier $300 million deal-to help make up for four years of Polish crop failures.

That afternoon, Carter held an unprecedented news conference for Polish and U.S. journalists. Even though the Warsaw government barred three dissident reporters from attending, it was a remarkably freewheeling session. One Polish reporter, Konstanty Jazowski, editor of a Baptist newspaper, asked Carter if he could help stop Polish Catholic discrimination against Baptists. The President ducked the question. He did so again when ABC Correspondent Sam Donaldson provocatively recalled how Carter had ridiculed Gerald Ford for wrongly claiming during a campaign debate that Poland was not dominated by Moscow. Asked Donaldson: "Do you see a day when Poland may actually be free?" Visibly upset, Carter lamely replied that the Poles had "a desire and a commitment not to be dominated" and refused to answer Donaldson's follow-up question.*

After a formal banquet, featuring saddie of venison and ice-cold vodka, and a second night in their lavish quarters at the baroque 17th century Wilanow Palace outside Warsaw, the Carters flew to Tehran. When Air Force One rolled to a stop at Mehrabad Airport, Carter was the first person to pop out of the door, his tan trenchcoat and slightly disheveled appearance contrasting a bit with the regal elegance of his host, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. On the way to the city, they drove along roads that were lined with more security men than well-wishers. Only a few hours earlier there had been five anti-American demonstrations.

During talks with the Shah at cream-colored Saadabad Palace, Carter played down his interest in human rights, dwelling instead on Arab-Israeli peace negotiations, Iran's desire to buy 400 U.S. combat fighters and American efforts to curb oil imports. They agreed on basic terms for the sale of six to eight nuclear reactors to Iran and to do what they can to end the war between Somalia and Ethiopia. That night Carter and the Shah, their wives and another visitor, Jordan's King Hussein, celebrated the new year at Tehran's Niavaran Palace.

Over breakfast the next morning, Carter sounded out Hussein about prospects for Arab-Israeli peace. Hussein fears that negotiations between Jerusalem and Cairo could founder unless Carter persuades the Israelis to permit self-determination for the Palestinians, at least some time in the future. Carter will explore the issue further when he meets on Wednesday for an hour or two with Egyptian President Anwar Sadat at Aswan-a stopover that was unexpectedly added to his schedule during the weekend (see WORLD).

From Tehran, Carter flew to India, where he was due to be welcomed by throngs of people at Delhi's Ram Lila Grounds, the same 19-acre field in which an estimated 1 million Indians waited for hours under a hot sun to greet Dwight Eisenhower in 1959. After spending the night at the red sandstone Rashtrapati Bhavan presidential palace. Carter on Monday was to begin a round of appearances that, says an aide, is designed to demonstrate U.S. support for a country that is trying to improve its lot "in the context of democratic institutions.''

If all goes according to schedule, the President will place a wreath at New Delhi's Rajhat shrine to Mohandas Gandhi, outline to the Indian Parliament his hopes for helping the world's poor and explore with Prime Minister Morarji Desai ways to improve U.S.-Indian relations. Under Desai's predecessor, Indira Gandhi, New Delhi warmed up to the Soviets and cold-shouldered the U.S., particularly after President Nixon's "tilt" in favor of Pakistan during the 1971 war with India. Desai and Carter will talk about how the U.S. could aid the Indian economy. The President is also expected to soothe the Indian apprehensions about the big U.S. air and naval base being built on the island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean.

At his next stop, Riyadh, Carter means to encourage Saudi Arabia's king Khalid and Crown Prince Fahd to continue their efforts to keep oil prices stable. Last month Saudi Arabia was a sponsor of the six-month lid on price increases that the OPEC nations approved at their conference in Caracas. Further, the President wants to urge the Saudi leaders to use their pursestring powers over poorer Arab countries to drum up more support for Middle East peace negotiations in Cairo. Khalid and Fahd will almost certainly seek assurances that the U.S. will press Israel for a solution that is fair to all Arabs, including the Palestinians.

On Wednesday, after his brief stopoff in Egypt, Carter is booked to fly to Paris for a wreath-laying at l'Arc de Triomphe, a walk along Normandy's Omaha Beach, one of the first to be stormed by Allied liberators in 1944, and dinner with President Valery Giscard d'Estaing at Versailles. Carter is expected to brief Giscard on the U.S.-Soviet strategic arms talks and will also discuss U.S. concern over the booming international arms business and the spread of atomic weapons. As a favor to Giscard, who leads a center-right political coalition that faces a strong challenge from the socialist and Communist parties in parliamentary elections this spring, Carter will make several public appearances.

On Friday, he plans a brief visit to Belgium to demonstrate U.S. support of NATO and the European Community, both headquartered in Brussels. Said a senior U.S. official: "We want to emphasize that we would welcome a Europe that is more united and to assure the Europeans that their security is, to us, our own security." At the end of the day, the American party will split up. Secretary of State Vance, accompanied by a delegation of Senators and Congressmen, is scheduled to head for Budapest, where he will return to Hungarian officials the thousand-year-old Crown of St. Stephen, which has been in U.S. hands since the end of World War II. Carter meanwhile will leave for home.

Although the President's advisers do not expect the trip to produce much immediately in terms of tangible results, TIME Correspondent Stanley Cloud, who accompanied Carter abroad, reports: "The trip could create a new mood in one country, a new understanding in another, a little more friendship here, a little less hostility there, a greater chance for long-range solutions to some difficult problems, a smaller chance for grave miscalculations of someone else's intentions."

It is precisely this kind of change in mood and tone that Carter regards as his most important accomplishment so far as President. In an interview with four TV reporters on the eve of his departure, he acknowledged that his biggest mistake was "inadvertently building up expectations too high," partly by underestimating the difficulty of getting legislation through Congress. His chief weakness, he said, is that he still finds it difficult to compromise. "But I am learning," declared Carter. He intends to apply this lesson to his top priorities for 1978: 1) getting Congress to complete work on the energy package; 2) winning passage of a $25 billion tax cut to improve the economy (though he conceded that he might not be able to balance the federal budget by the end of his four-year term); and 3) persuading the Senate to ratify the Panama Canal treaty.

But Carter insisted that he has succeeded in "having our nation and its Government more accurately reflect the hopes and dreams of the American people." He expressed some bewilderment over the swelling criticism from labor leaders, businessmen, blacks and feminists. "Who is happy?" asked ABC'S Barbara Walters. In reply, Carter maintained that his critics have been given too much attention. Said he: "The threat to our country is that we might, in grasping for advantage or in emphasizing differences, lose that sense of common commitment and common purpose and a common future that binds us together and makes us great."

Then, his voice thick with emotion, he echoed one of his most familiar campaign themes. He had tried, he said, to make the Government as "good and decent and idealistic" as Americans are themselves. He added: "If I have achieved anything, it has been to restore a tone to our nation's life and an attitude that most accurately exemplifies what we stand for." After almost a year of the high-pressure realities of the Oval Office, the man from Plains, Ga., appears to have lost little of the optimism and almost naive idealism that he exhibited as a candidate-and that he took with him overseas last week. --

* Carter provided a jarring note of his own by using the imperial "we" a number of times-something he has rarely done in the past.

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