ANATOMY OF DIPLOMACY: The Origin and Extent of American Foreign Policy

A rather self-indulgent, intermittently entertaining tract, less informative than the portentous title would suggest, by the ex-Ambassador to seven countries, from 1925 to 1962. As in Farewell to Foggy Bottom (1964), Briggs inveighs against ""trained"" diplomats and the hypertrophy of agencies for aid, propaganda, and intelligence, which he considers mere adjuncts to negotiation, reportage and representation. On foreign policy he is an old-fashioned conservative Cold Warrior, taking sharp pokes at U.S. development aid programs while exaggerating their altruistic element. Indeed, he concludes that ""for a generation"" Americans have been over-concerned with moral action at the expense of national interest, a thesis he applies to Latin America, NATO, Vietnam, etc. Briggs' penchant for metaphor leads to an excess of personifications and hypostatizations; but his orotund style is a matter of taste, and at any rate his name may still have a certain cachet.