Texas Envoy

Tough new job for Strauss if

"I'm not damn fool enough to think I know anything about the Middle East." Thus, with a typically guileful display of candor, Robert S. Strauss, 60, assessed his qualifications for the diplomatic assignment passed on to him last week by Jimmy Carter: to be the nation's superambassador for the second stage of Middle East peace negotiations, which begin in 3 1/2 weeks.

The ebullient former chairman of the Democratic National Committee was a surprising choice for that task. Strauss, whose father-in-law founded the Texas chapter of the American Jewish Committee, had hitherto been known primarily as a highly effective back-room pol. His arm-twisting skill in negotiating a new pact that lowered tariffs between the U.S. and its major trading partners and his rapport with the President seem to have weighed more heavily with Carter than Strauss's uncertain knowledge of Middle Eastern realities. Says an Administration official: "The object was to get a guy in there who could speak with the authority of the President, so that Carter won't have to get as closely involved as he did the last time around."

Egyptian and Israeli officials welcomed the appointment. State Department sources insisted that it was not a slap at Alfred L. Atherton Jr., the career diplomat who preceded him in this job and who will be named Ambassador to Cairo. As one former aide put it, Strauss can "take two guys that are in total disagreement with each other into a room and walk out later with neither of the two satisfied but both having stepped a lot closer together." One Texas-size question: Will the cajoling style that served Strauss so well in smoke-filled rooms at Democratic conventions have the same effect on Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin?

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.