Our Man in Peking

"I thought it was very important to name a man of great stature to this position," said President Nixon last week in appointing David K.E. Bruce to be the first U.S. representative to China's Communist government. Indeed, Bruce is a splendid choice.

He is the only American diplomat to have held the three most prestigious posts in Europe: ambassador to France from 1949 to 1952, to West Germany from 1957 to 1959, and to Britain from 1961 to 1969 (the longest term there ever for a U.S. envoy). Two and a half years ago, Nixon called him out of retirement to represent the U.S. at the Paris peace talks, which he did for twelve months. Now, at age 75, he once again comes out of retirement, officially to head the U.S. liaison office in Peking, but unofficially to act as ambassador to China in everything but name. Said Henry Kissinger, who was influential in convincing the President to name Bruce: "He's the best man we have."

By all accounts the Chinese welcome his appointment. Bruce, nominally a Democrat, has served under every President since Harry Truman and thus enjoys the support of both U.S. political parties. He is the same age as Chou En-lai and only five years younger than Mao Tse-tung--a fact that runs against the American obsession with youth but fits in congenially with the Chinese respect for age and experience.

Tall, gray-haired, the picture of a diplomat, Bruce combines a straightforward analytical mind with an urbane sense of humor and an elegant appreciation for wines and art. Son of a former U.S. Senator from Maryland, he went to Princeton and the law schools of the universities of Maryland and Virginia. At various times he was elected to both the Maryland and Virginia legislatures and was a banker and manufacturer of parachutes. During World War II he directed the European operations of the Office of Strategic Services, the U.S. foreign intelligence unit. After the war, Truman appointed Bruce, in quick succession, Assistant Secretary of Commerce, head of the Marshall Plan Mission to France, and then ambassador to France.

When he opens his office in Peking about May 1, Bruce will face three disadvantages: his diplomatic career has focused largely on Europe; he has never been to China; he does not speak the language. But as his chief deputies he will have two of the Government's leading China experts, Alfred Le S. Jenkins, 56, of the State Department and John H. Holdridge, 48, of the White House National Security Council. Bruce's office will be staffed by seven other experts from the State Department and a support group of 20 administrative workers. The mission probably will be located on the outskirts of Peking in the new diplomatic compound, which resembles a middle-income housing project. Despite the contrast between the lavishness of the Court of St. James's and the sparse Chinese life-style ahead of them, Bruce and his wife Evangeline are delighted about going. Mrs. Bruce, the daughter of a Foreign Service officer, speaks six languages and once studied under Harvard's great China expert, John K. Fairbank. Wherever she travels, she is a leading diplomatic hostess.

The liaison office's first tasks will be to handle cultural exchanges and trade between the U.S. and China. Almost negligible a few years ago, U.S. trade with China is currently running at the rate of $300 million annually, a figure which was not expected to be reached for another ten years. But the main function of the office will be to open regular contact between two estranged and, until recently, hostile countries that have everyday business to talk about.

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