On the Overseas Line

During one of several calls to London last week about the Cyprus crisis, Henry Kissinger reached British Foreign Secretary James Callaghan in Prime Minister Harold Wilson's office at No. 10 Downing Street. After a few moments of conversation, Kissinger told Callaghan that "I am here in the Oval Office with the President and he would like a few words with you, Jim, and the Prime Minister." Gerald Ford then spent ten minutes complimenting Britain's efforts to contain the Cyprus situation and emphasizing his commitment to continuity in U.S. foreign policy. Whitehall officials later happily declared Anglo-American relations to be the warmest since the early 1960s, when Harold Macmillan's and John Kennedy's rambling phone conversations added "Jack-Mac" talks to the vocabulary of transatlantic diplomacy.

Throughout his first week in the Oval Office, Ford handled U.S. foreign relations with more assurance and subtlety than many observers at home and abroad had expected. He held White House talks with Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin, Egypt's Foreign Minister Ismail Fahmy and South Viet Nam's Ambassador Tran Kim Phuong; all left--considerably reassured about the depth of the new Administration's commitment to promises made earlier by Richard Nixon.

Ford also talked Middle East politics with visiting King Hussein of Jordan. The President scored heavily with the Japanese by swiftly picking up an original invitation to Nixon to visit Tokyo some time after the November elections--the first visit there by a U.S. President. Ford also pocketed a diplomatic IOU by agreeing to hold talks late next month with Japan's politically embattled Premier Kakuei Tanaka, who feels he can score points at home by negotiating with the new President. Ford extended a similar invitation to West Germany's new Chancellor, Helmut Schmidt, who plans to come to Washington when the United Nations General Assembly opens next month. The Chief Executive invited Greece's new civilian Premier, Constantine Caramanlis, to visit Washington to discuss the Cyprus crisis, but the Premier decided it would be unwise to leave Athens "at this time."

What impressed foreign leaders most of all was Ford's diplomacy on Capitol Hill in the matters of the trade bill. The President agreed to initiate an exchange of letters from Moscow in which the Soviets would consent to end harassment of Jews and to allow all Jews to leave who seek emigration applications (35,000 last year). Assuming the Soviets go along, the Ford compromise clears the way for passage of the bill.

Across the world, the public is still struggling to get a handle on the new U.S. leader. European commentators have generally tried to find Ford parallels in Harry Truman. Ettore Delia Giovanna, 61, Italian television's version of Eric Sevareid, has been presenting the President as "a noble expression of the average American--that average American which has made America great and powerful." Like many U.S. newsmen, European editors have dwelt more or less heavily on Ford's supposed lack of intellectual heft.

Despite such occasional reservations, observers are beginning to recognize advantages in the fact that Ford's strong suit is domestic politics. Nixon in his last months seemed to many diplomats to be using foreign policy as a way of dealing with his domestic problems; doubts rose as to whether he had the political wherewithal at home to make good on the agreements he was signing on his trips abroad. For that reason foreign leaders who tuned into Ford's speech to Congress were encouraged by the President's warmly received promise to cultivate Capitol Hill, as well as his emphasis on inflation and other domestic issues. Says Ian Smart, deputy director of Britain's prestigious Royal Institute of International Affairs: "The U.S. as the center of influence, the way in which its economy is run, the way in which it will conduct itself as a buyer and seller of resources, are of far more importance than the panoply of international negotiations and international relationships. [Ford's] best contribution abroad will be to establish that he has his domestic situation under control." That will be truest in Western Europe.

TIME'S Chief European Correspondent William Rademaekers observes: "The new leaders in Europe want more joint cooperation and less public clashing over cosmic proposals such as Kissinger's Atlantic Charter speech of 1973. To them this means more consultation on a range of problems from inflation to the environment. It does not necessarily mean summitry or an American President living out of a suitcase. It does mean hard talking at the Cabinet level, and a President who can deliver on his promises--get bills through Congress and lobby with the American people for what he believes. Europeans joke about our Presidents-- Johnson the Texas sheriff, Kennedy of Camelot, Nixon the crisis manager. Now they feel they have an all-American boy. They do not know exactly what that means; but they seem eager and willing for a fresh start."

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