Carter Decides to Stay Home

He puts off a big trip to fight a big battle

There is no better tonic for a President in trouble than a tour of the horizon aboard Air Force One. Red-carpet welcomes and cheering crowds in far-off places boost his morale and make him a world statesman, not just a politician, to the folks back home. Jimmy Carter prescribed for himself precisely that tonic last September: he was suffering a decline in the polls, and his closest adviser, Bert Lance, was fighting a losing battle for his job. Carter planned to visit nine countries in eleven days, starting Nov. 22. But last week he decided to call off the four-continent whirlwind --and thus became the first President to unpack his bags on the eve of a major, announced foreign trip since Dwight Eisenhower was prevented from going to Japan in 1960 because of anti-American riots by left-wing Japanese students.

Carter's reason for the dramatic change in plans: his energy program, the No. 1 item on his agenda, was nearing a crisis point in Congress. Whether his proposals would be accepted, he felt, depended on his being on hand to cajole wavering legislators. How would it look, his political advisers asked, if the President were off motorcading through the streets of Lagos, Nigeria, or lunching with the Shah of Iran when they were frantically trying to reach him on the phone so that he could talk to a recalcitrant Senator?

For weeks Carter had been underscoring his concern about the fate of the energy bill by threatening to sacrifice his trip abroad for the sake of a last-minute, all-out onslaught on Capitol Hill. The threat had become a promise, and it was a promise he had to keep.

At 7:30 Friday morning, Carter met with Vice President Walter Mondale, Secretary of State Cyrus Vance and National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski in the Oval Office for an hour and 25 minutes. They confronted three options: go ahead with the trip, 'cancel it, or postpone it until late December or early January, before Congress reconvenes. They settled on the third option, recognizing that because of the difficulty in lining up so many heads of state, Carter might have to visit the nine nations in two separate journeys.

The postponement is an embarrassment to the entire Administration, since it contributes to the impression of a Chief Executive who is losing control of events.

The switch in plans was a particular disappointment to Brzezinski, who had masterminded the trip. But it came as something of a relief to many of Carter's aides, including Vance, who all along had questioned the wisdom of the expedition, even though Vance defended it in public. During last year's presidential campaign, Carter said he would not travel abroad in his first year in office. Yet he had already attended the London summit in May, and here he was preparing to plunge into a grab bag of nations (Brazil, Venezuela, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, India, Iran, France, Poland and Belgium) with little hope of emerging with a common theme or coherent message. The inclusion of Brazil and Iran ruled out an overall emphasis on human rights, and the European portion made it difficult to bill the exercise as a courtesy call on the Third World.

Brzezinski spoke of highlighting "our emerging relationships," but that rationale evoked little enthusiasm at Foggy Bottom. "Typical Brzezinski," scoffed one State Department official. "He has no attention span, so he has the President jumping around like a frog."

In the places where Carter intended to land, word of the cancellation produced disappointment, naturally enough. Warsaw's two main Western-built hotels, the Forum and the Victoria Inter-Continental, have long been refusing tourist bookings for the two weeks beginning Nov. 24, and a brand-new press club was to be specially opened for Carter's arrival. The government of Edward Gierek had high hopes that the visit would produce tangible benefits in trade and other economic exchanges. In Brazil, the change of plans added a layer of glare ice to an already chilly relationship. The Brazilians had hoped that Carter's visit would ease tensions--centering on nuclear proliferation and human rights--between the two countries. Carter created another kind of scheduling problem for himself in Paris. Unless he can cash his rain check by early 1978, the President will run smack into France's March elections; the French left might well accuse him of giving an unfair boost to President Valery Giscard d'Estaing and his allies.

In addition, now that the trip has been postponed, Carter is in more danger of appearing paralyzed in the eyes of some foreign observers. While he may have given himself no choice but to stay home this month, he has raised even higher the stakes--and the visibility--of his gambit on behalf of his energy bill. Now, if he is still unable to get the energy package he wants, his failure will have a worldwide audience.

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