higher authority. It should therefore usually be possible to assume that the assignment of leadership responsibility has not been made arbitrarily or without good cause, that it will be accepted in good spirit by all concerned, and that there will be generally a disposition to cooperate as fully as possible within the situation in which each participating agency finds itself.

Recognition that the coordination process among equals is one of agreement and not of command implies the possibility of disagreement and recognizes that for some purposes each of the participants may have what amounts to a veto power. In such a situation, the withholding of agreement to proposals that are strongly and responsibly sponsored by an appropriate agency implies the existence of formidable obstacles arising directly from the responsibilities of the particular agency that is unable to agree. Thus, for example, the Department of State may itself refuse to accept a particular course of action on grounds arising out of relations with particular foreign countries, whether it does or does not have the responsibility for leadership in securing agreement in the particular case. In the same way, an agency with mainly domestic concerns may find itself unable to agree to a proposed course because some firmly established line of domestic policy appears to intervene. Under conditions such as have existed in recent years, it is not surprising that major difficulties in the way of interdepartmental agreement have been chronic. Progress has been possible only by the exercise of great patience and perseverance on the part of those who have been directed to work together in search of agreed courses of action.

When agreement is not possible at the departmental level, the agency with leadership responsibility has the further responsibility for seeing to it that the unresolved disagreement is promptly referred to higher authority, usually the President, either directly or through one of his staff agencies. It can then be assumed that in appropriate cases, he will make the decision. More often than not, however, he may well find it appropriate to send the matter back with further instructions designed to facilitate agreement at lower levels and to reduce the number of similar cases that will reach him in the future. This would seem essential if the President's own work load is to be held within limits of feasibility.

It is generally agreed that coordination should take place progressively at all levels of government. The decisions and actions in one field must be coordinated with those in other fields on which they impinge most directly, preferably at a time in the sequence of events at which the decisions in each case are still fluid and subject to change. Coordination should therefore begin at the lowest levels of staff work in the governmental hierarchy. Final coordination at the top tends to become something like an adjudicative process.

The alternatives previously discussed under the issue of coordination are directly pertinent to our present concern, and provide a means for applying the analysis just set forth. The first alternative, leadership responsibility for securing coordination of representation, reporting, and negotiation, should be considered the normal minimum role of the Department of State and the Foreign Service. Ordinarily the Department of State should be expected to function as indicated in the statement of the alternative, with exceptions, however, whenever the President has assigned specific responsibilities elsewhere. Representation and negotiation are the heart of the functions of any foreign office, and the base on which all other functions are built. There is, moreover, no conflict between this role and that of program administration by the Department of State. On the other hand, where foreign program administration is carried on in another agency, joint arrangements between the Department and that agency are necessary when negotiations reach the governmental level.

Even in the field of negotiations there can be no monopoly for the Department of State. The Department represents the United States in dealings with other governments as part of its routine duty. Other departments also represent the United States in intergovernmental negotiations for special purposes. The President, for example, designated the Treasury Department to negotiate a loan with the British Government in 1946. The Secretary of the Treasury was also the chairman of the Anglo-American financial talks held in September 1949. Presidents in the past appointed special emissaries, such as Colonel House and Harry Hopkins, to negotiate on special matters; as indicated above, these are considered to be exceptions to the general rule, and should continue to be so regarded.

The development of foreign policy objectives and strategies and the framing of program proposals are broader responsibilities than representation, reporting, and negotiation. These functions require the personal attention of the President to a much greater extent, and constitute an area where it is desirable to maintain the utmost flexibility. The attempt to define jurisdictional interests in this area might have unfortunate results. The functions described are ones that the Department of State has been performing to a large extent already, and in which it exerts a natural leadership by virtue of the position of the Secretary of State as chief foreign policy adviser to the President. But they are also duties in which other agencies have a position. In particular, it seems doubtful that the Department of State should be considered a source of authoritative advice to the President on questions that affect its own jurisdiction, questions that frequently arise directly or indirectly in program planning. The President should retain the final power on these matters, not only in theory, but as a matter of working practice.

Review of objectives, policies, and strategies of implementation falls into another category. The performance of agencies on program matters will be a matter for active consideration here. This is a delicate question, and in the nature of the case, seems to be one that is mainly a responsibility for the Executive Office. This would be especially true in the case where the Department of State is itself the program administrator.

Some of the same considerations apply to the question of presentation of program proposals to the Congress. In the initial presentation of a foreign program proposal to Congress, the Department of State has an essential role. Unless the Department is prepared to be actively in favor of a foreign program, there is little likelihood of success in any event. This makes the Department the appropriate leader, as a general rule, in securing coordination of the initial presentation to Congress. If there is a serious disagreement among agencies on the issue of administration, however, the responsibility of the President for the proposal to be presented to Congress would become an active one. On subsequent presentations for an established program, the responsibility for securing coordination will be dependent upon the general pattern of administrative responsibility for the

program.

When legislation and appropriations have been secured, the problem of coordination arises in relation to program operations. Such operations usually involve direct relations with other governments; they may also involve a wide variety of supporting administrative activities in this country and abroad. It would seem that when administrative responsibility for a foreign program has been clearly vested in another agency, the Department of State should not seek to assume responsibility for leadership in the coordination of actual operations except as those operations directly involve relations with other governments. To the extent that such relations are involved, it would seem consistent with the primary functions of the Department of State that it should be fully informed and that it should always have the right to request that action be suspended pending consultation and possible appeal to the President in those cases where action is proposed in terms that appear unwise to the Department. The extent to which the Department should have a further positive responsibility for leadership in the coordination of program relations with other governments may depend upon a variety of factors, including the extent to which each program is capable of autonomous administration without endangering other objectives of foreign policy. As already indicated in discussing the first alternative under this issue, it is our view that the Department of State should have at least a joint responsibility for any negotiations at the governmental level even when the primary

administrative responsibility for a foreign program has been vested in another agency.

The specific types of foreign program previously singled out for attention in this report include military and economic aid, occupied areas administration, and overseas information. It now becomes our task to apply the conclusions just developed to the questions as they arise for these specific programs.

Administration of military and economic aid

In the present period of national defense emergency, there can be no doubt that all of the existing programs of military and economic aid should be directed toward the same goal. The goal is to strengthen the free world against the possibility of Communist attack or subversion. The current diffusion of foreign aid activity, with a variety of objectives at least partially inconsistent with each other and with equal variety in administrative arrangements, no longer seems appropriate.

We therefore reaffirm the conclusion of our preliminary report in December 1950, that all forms of foreign aid should so far as possible be conceived, authorized, and carried out as one program, with a single controlling declaration of policy.

As we said before, this does not mean that the entire administration of a unified program of military and economic aid can or should be carried out through a single executive department or agency. The Department of Defense must continue to be responsible for a great part of the unified task. The Economic Cooperation Administration should be continued and should likewise be responsible for a great part of the unified task. The Department of State already occupies an important position in the efforts that have been going on in recent months to bring about a greater unification of the existing programs; it should continue to have major responsibilities in the unified task. But there is question as to the exact extent of the appropriate responsibilities of the Department of State, as indicated by the previous discussion in this chapter under the first issue. In our preliminary report, we favored arrangements along the lines presented in this chapter as the fourth alternative under issue one. Those arrangements, while recognizing major responsibilities of all of the agencies concerned, would have made specific provision for centralized leadership above the departmental level through the appointment of a director of military and economic aid in the Executive Office of the President.

We arrived at that recommendation in part on the basis of pragmatic considerations, particularly doubts as to how rapidly the job could in practice be moved forward under the leadership of the Department of State in the absence of more effective intervention by the Executive Office than appeared to be occurring. We were also doubtful as to

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the extent to which it would be possible to vest effectively the task of coordination and program leadership in any one of the three executive agencies most concerned with program policy and operations. As we said in the preliminary report, the most fundamental question in a program of the magnitude contemplated for a unified program of military and economic aid, going so directly to the interests and prerogatives of the Department of Defense and the Economic Cooperation Administration,

is the question of whether two other powerful agencies, of Cabinet rank, will accept the exercise of enough coordinative authority by the Department of State or any officer in it, including the Secretary, to assure the necessary degree of unity and effective action.

The body of analysis and doctrine brought together in this chapter should assist in the further consideration of this question. We have already indicated that the Department of State has often served as a program operator. We have also concluded that in those cases where another agency has operating responsibility for a foreign program, the Department of State should review the operations from the foreign affairs point of view and should be responsible for leadership in securing coordination for all of those aspects of the task in which the general foreign affairs interest is primary. In those cases where the Department is responsible for securing coordination, its responsibility is more than the neutral responsibility of a staff agency assisting the President. It is a positive responsibility for leadership arising out of the major functions of the Department as an executive department.

In the case of military and economic aid, it can be argued that the same reasons that impel a unified program provide justification for assigning the leadership responsibility in the coordination of such a program to the Department of State. On this basis, the Department should be responsible for securing coordinated program planning of the detailed objectives of the program and of the distribution of funds between military and economic forms of aid, as well as the balance and distribution of funds between major political areas and countries.

The analysis of coordinative responsibilities becomes particularly difficult in this case, however, because the aspects of the program to be carried out by the Department of Defense and the Economic Cooperation Administration cannot be regarded as merely incidental by comparison with the parts of the task of greatest concern to the Department of State. It can be argued that the interests of all three agencies should be regarded as very nearly coordinate. We were inclined to accept that position in preparing our preliminary report, and it has been a significant factor in our view as to the kind and