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All these and other complaints came together in a withering but inchoate speech on the Senate floor by Idaho's Frank Church, long a fervent aid supporter. Helping nations in Africa and Asia as a means of containing Communism is absurd, he contended: the people are "too poor and illiterate to be interested in such sophistications as ideology or revolution." In other cases, "for many countries radical revolution is the only real hope for development and the single most helpful thing we can do is to leave them alone." In most cases, he continued, U.S. attempts to bring about "stability" through aid actually prevent development. Reason: the U.S. insists on a favorable climate for American business investment rather than allowing the countries to develop as they need to. Aid merely props up the existing social and political order.
Even supporters of the aid program have to admit that many of Church's criticisms are on target. But he dismissed too glibly the massive successes of aid in the past and was far too casual about the basic U.S. position in the world. It is one thing to urge America to recognize its limitations; it is quite another to sit back and, as he put it, let nature take its course. Minority Leader Hugh Scott admitted that "we can expect revolution upon revolution" in the Third World, but he still feels that the U.S. must "participate modestly in the hope that they will turn out in ways compatible with our own interests and ideals." Most anti-aid arguments, complained Scott, amount to "telling the world to stop because we want to get off."
Anonymous Giving. Actually the Administration made reform proposals last April that might have met at least some of the critics' objections. But the House considered the reforms too complex to be handled this year and pigeonholed them. The Nixon plan was to split foreign aid into its three properly distinct parts, much as Fulbright wants to do.
One important objective of the reforms would be to channel a larger share of U.S. aid through such multinational agencies as the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the Inter-American Development Bank. This too is something that Democratic critics have been demanding. Theoretically, at least, an independent international agency can channel funds on a sounder, less political basis, thus avoiding the appearance of big-power meddling by the major donor.
There are practical dangers; an agency with broad representation may try to spread the available funds too widely so as to give everyone a share, thus preventing maximum impact anywhere. Relatively anonymous giving is also harder to sell to Congress and the public than are specific grants. Those objections may turn out to be unimportant.
Since both the Administration and the Senate seem increasingly determined on reform, it looks inevitable. But time is required for reforms, let alone for a redefinition of America's place in the world. These things cannot be achieved in haste, anger or boredom. Thus the immediate need is to save the present program, however clumsy, until something more rational can be enacted to take its place.