(3 of 10)
As a result, Kissinger is already widely suspected in Washington of being a would-be usurper of the powers traditionally delegated to the State and Defense Departments and other branches of Government. Senate Foreign Relations Chairman J. William Fulbright fears that the new NSC organization will "move in the direction of taking very important matters out of the hands of the traditional agencies, most of which felt a responsibility to Congress." In the White House itself, one aide who is close to Nixon says: "Kissinger is seen as tremendously talented, energetic and hardworking, going all the time. But there is a certain wariness about him and the whole empire he is building." The President has been forced to issue repeated assurances that Secretary of State William Rogers is indeed the principal adviser on foreign policy, and the State Department the principal executor of that policy.
Theoretically, Kissinger's main job is not to advise the President on a particular course of action in a given situation. Rather it is to draw on the resources of the operating agencies—primarily State, Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency—and develop all the information and options available so that the President can reach decisions with the fullest possible understanding of their ultimate implications.
To that end, the machinery surrounding the National Security Council has been elaborately revised.
"Foreign policy," says Kissinger, "isn't made by answering cables." Nixon remembered only too well the efforts during the Eisenhower Administration to establish a workable structure through the National Security Council. The forms were created, but there was not much in the way of ideas. In reaction, John Kennedy swept away the NSC substructure and relied on more spontaneous methods. Lyndon Johnson virtually abandoned the NSC and used the "Tuesday luncheon" with top advisers as the principal form of deliberation. The meetings were so informal that there is no known official record of the discussions or the decisions made over the table. There was no machinery for the systematic follow-up of policy.
Nixon came into office determined to restore some of the formalities of the Eisenhower years and at the same time make them more creative. As in the past, there are five planning subcommittees with responsibility for as many areas of the world. Now, however, they will come under the NSC instead of the State Department, although an Assistant Secretary of State will act as chairman of each. To these are being added five groups set up by function (see chart).
No Basement Policy
After the subgroups complete work on a given issue, the conclusions are sent to a new NSC review board, chaired by Kissinger. Here competing views are refined and new material can be added. It is Kissinger's review board that prepares the final working document for NSC consideration. Finally, after an NSC decision has been made, overseeing its implementation among the departments becomes the responsibility of a committee headed by Under Secretary of State Elliot Richardson. Kissinger is a member of that body as well.