Despite being regarded as an ugly duckling by the foreign policy establishment, USIA-led public diplomacy efforts played a key role in achieving several important foreign policy objectives. Notable was the successful campaign to persuade Western European publics to accept deployment of intermediate-range nuclear missiles in the face of a vigorous Soviet influence effort. It was widely accepted that public diplomacy lay at the core of a vital international objective. This perspective is vital to any re-creation of a fully effective public diplomacy agency.
I suggest that establishment of a “USIA 2.0” might lie closer to the mark than Mr. Gates’s prescription. Such an organization must have the interagency clout that Mr. Gates suggests should be done within State. It should be able to do battle on more than equal terms within the entire spectrum of Russian and Chinese influence campaigns. Its views and input should become an integral component within the foreign policy planning and execution process. In instances where its input must be subordinated to overarching military or other national security considerations, the consequences must be fully taken into account.
As Mr. Gates wrote, failure to counter our adversaries’ aggressive efforts to subvert democracy carries grave risks. We must give urgent consideration to presenting the world’s publics with the real choice: freedom-extinguishing totalitarian oppression abetted by the insidious use of modern technology or human dignity within a rules-based international order.
John S. Williams, Fairfax Station
The writer was a Foreign Service officer with the U.S. Information Agency from 1968 to 1995.
Former defense secretary Robert M. Gates was on the mark when he wrote about the need for an affirmative vision in our global messaging. In my days as administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development, I framed our humanitarian and development assistance in terms of helping countries on their “journey to self-reliance.” I liked to say that our goal in partnering with countries in the developing world is to help them evolve from aid recipients to aid partners to, eventually, fellow donors. There wasn’t one time when I didn’t see heads nodding in my audience.
It seems that our messaging these days emphasizes — explicitly or, more often, implicitly — our self-interest. When we speak to Africans about competition with China or strategic partnerships, their first reaction, quite naturally, is, “Okay, this isn’t about us and our aspirations; it’s about them and their rivalry with Beijing.” When we speak in the Americas, our implied message seems migration-heavy: “Okay, we don’t really want your people coming here, but hey, let’s be friends.”
Throughout our history, people have turned to the United States because the American Dream is really a universal one. Why don’t our global engagement and messaging reflect that?
Mark A. Green, Washington
The writer, a former ambassador, is president and chief executive of the Wilson Center.
Robert M. Gates wrote, “The president and Congress need to ensure that the secretary of state is empowered to provide broad strategic guidance to the Agency for Global Media, which manages all U.S. foreign broadcasting.”
It depends on what “broad strategic guidance” means. The National Security Council has been providing guidance to the U.S. Agency for Global Media concerning its language services and target countries. Does Mr. Gates want to switch this authority to the State Department?
But if “broad strategic guidance” means specifying what content should be emphasized and de-emphasized, the audience will perceive the result as propaganda. And they will tune in elsewhere.
Kim Andrew Elliott, Arlington
The writer is a retired Voice of America audience research analyst.
