Thomas Pickering : A Professional Holds the Spotlight as U.S. Envoy to the United Nations

UNITED NATIONS —  Almost from the start, sensitive posts came the way of Thomas Reeve Pickering, 59, now U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. His foreign assignments during more than three decades with the State Department read like a thriller of Third World tensions: Geneva, Zanzibar, Tanzania, Jordan, Nigeria, El Salvador and Israel.

His first significant post was probably the most exotic. Pickering, a young foreign-service officer, arrived on the fabled island of Zanzibar in March, 1965. Only a year earlier, the Africans had overthrown the sultan, slain thousands of Arabs, expelled Western diplomats and encouraged communist Chinese aid.

To counteract the violence and communist influence, President Julius Nyerere of Tanganyika persuaded the Zanzibaris to join his mainland country. Tanzania was born in late April, 1964. Pickering was sent for training in Swahili, the native language of Zanzibar. In a few months, he arrived as principal officer of the U.S. consulate of Zanzibar, an autonomous region of Tanzania.

Ever since, Pickering has been known among his fellow foreign-service officers as the consummate professional. He served as ambassador to Jordan, Nigeria, El Salvador and Israel. His El Salvador post came during the delicate years of 1983 to 1985, when the Reagan Administration was trying to persuade a skeptical Congress that the Salvadoran government was embarked on democratic reforms. Many in Congress remained skeptical, but this did not hurt Pickering when the Senate confirmed him as U.N. ambassador in 1989.

The roster of former U.N. ambassadors is replete with high-profile and politically charged names: Adlai E. Stevenson II, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Andrew Young, Arthur J. Goldberg, Jeane J. Kirkpatrick, Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., George Bush. Only one foreign-service officer had ever served before--Young’s deputy, Donald F. McHenry. Important people jockey for this kind of job. Bush’s surprise nomination of Pickering boosted State Department morale.

A tall, balding man with an easy manner, Pickering is popular among correspondents covering the United Nations. His replies, though sometimes complex, are clear and thoughtful. The Gulf crisis put an intense spotlight on him. That kind of public glare for a career ambassador sometimes troubles political appointees in Washington, but it delights the U.S. foreign service.

Question: There was the strong view at the U.N.--especially among Third World nations--that in the Gulf crisis President Bush used the U.N. for his own agenda and is, therefore, less likely to depend on it in the future. Is Bush likely to not depend on the U.N. as much?

Answer: I don’t think so, and I think this question of the U.S. role in the U.N. during the Gulf crisis is part and product of the school of thought best epitomized by a number of my colleagues who have said, until August, everybody complained that the U.S. wasn’t using the U.N. enough. After August, they complained that the U.S. was using the U.N. too much. So where’s the golden mean? What day were we doing it just right?

. . . . The U.N. has been a very effective instrument of international collective security, but it just so happened, as well, that it mirrored our objectives in the crisis, and we think this is all to the good.

Q: What about the Bush Administration threat that no sanctions against Iraq will be lifted unless Saddam Hussein is ousted or removed? Isn’t that a clear-cut example of the U.S. turning its back on the U.N. and ignoring the Security Council resolution?

A: Not at all, because, in fact, the language used has been very careful. It talked about all possible sanctions will remain in effect. Indeed, the resolutions, with respect to a wide range of these sanctions, give the Security Council a decision-making role in that process. We have said when that comes to a decision, we will take into account Saddam’s continued domination of Iraq as a major factor in making our decision.

Q: There’s a topic popular at the U.N. now--a new secretary general. What kind of person is the U.S. looking for?

A: We’re looking for somebody . . . (who), perhaps in addition to what we have looked for in the past . . . has tremendous capabilities in management and administration. Our view is the U.N. is still badly in need of internal reform and restructuring, and the new secretary general will have to carry it out.

I think, finally, we are looking for someone who can communicate the goals and objectives and the ideas of the United Nations to the world community, who can work harmoniously with the Security Council and who can play the kind of role in the context of the support that we believe we should receive from the international community to deal with these crises and regional disputes that we now have popping up all around . . . .

Q: Some say it’s time for someone dramatic--like Margaret Thatcher or Eduard Shevardnadze or Pierre Trudeau.

A: . . . . I think there is a feeling around the organization, shared by many, that it might be time for the organization to try to raise its sights. We’re entering a new decade. The organization has new capacities and capabilities. It’s going through a reform process. It seems to be in the centerpiece of a lot of countries’ foreign-policy interests in many issues. The secretary general can obviously play a serious and important role in that regard. So somebody with name recognition but, more importantly, proof of accomplished record . . . .

Q: The question of a more rational system of choosing a secretary general has come up. Reportely, when Kurt Waldheim was selected, the process was so weak nobody looked under “W” in the War Crimes File. Will we have a more rational system?

A: . . . . I think a more rational system, hopefully, will produce an earlier date for election so there can be a transition between the two, that we don’t rush the turnover at the end of the year. People have suggested a search committee, but there’s always difficulty. Who is on the search committee?

. . . . To raise the sights, you want to get people stimulated and thinking early about the process and thinking it through carefully. You want to have candidates on notice that if they don’t come forward in time, their chances of moving ahead are reasonably diminished, and that we want to have, in fact, candidates organizing their campaigns so that before the final voting, everybody who is a real and genuine candidate is broadly enough and well enough known. The question of looking under the letter “W,” in my view, is pre-eminently a question for national governments and for our government, which should be clear, if we’re going to vote for a particular individual, that he’s been carefully vetted--so, in fact, we don’t repeat what were obviously faults and errors of the Waldheim selection.

Q: As a former ambassador to Israel, and someone who knows the Middle East well--why has the Gulf War failed to ease the Arab-Israeli peace process?

A: I don’t agree with the premise of your question. I think it has made a change; I think that despite the fact that, with all the vicissitudes and difficulties of the peace process, some of our more learned commentators and correspondents have said there is no window of opportunity, I think there is. I think it’s too early yet to describe totally and in what way how that will lead to success, but I think you see changes in the positions of the Arab states. The Gulf countries have certainly expressed a change in their position in recent weeks. Both Egypt and Syria are engaged intensively in the negotiations in the way that I think reflects a change in their position.

My feeling is that the degree of Soviet involvement, the intensity of it, and the support for the general principles of the peace settlement, which are not necessarily prevalent in the Soviet view in the past, when they totally supported only the radical Arab point of view, are also indications of change. They’re also indications of change, in my view, with respect to the Israeli side of the equation. Some of them having to do with an increased sense of intensity over the peace process as a result of the conflict and the real trauma and shock administered by the conflict. Sometimes that impels toward rapid solutions, sometimes that holds back. But all those are in the hopper. All those, I think, have changed the configuration of events, and I think they are playing a role. We’ve finally looked at the diminished role of the PLO, which is certainly a part and parcel of serious errors in their own decision-making in support of Saddam.

Q: Would the process be helped if the General Assembly repealed or changed the “Zionism is racism” resolution?

A: I think that’s absolutely true, and I think that same view was expressed here by the secretary general in some very candid statements he made.

Q: Are there plans to try and change?

A: Yes, we have been engaged in that process for some time and we continue to evaluate the situation and see what can be done. Obviously, we can’t move prematurely, because another loss on the issue would represent a serious setback. But I think opinion is beginning to increasingly coalesce around the point that it would be an enormously advantageous step . . .

Q: Do you think Israel wants a change?

A: Israel definitely wants a change.

Q: But there’s some argument that it’s a convenience for them not to move on the resolution.

A: Well, I spent three and a half years in Israel. I can’t believe that anybody seriously argues that point.

Q: I’d like to try and talk about your role as a career foreign-service officer in this position. Why do you think President Bush appointed a career ambassador to the U.N.?

A: I would say this: I was so delighted to be appointed that I didn’t question his motives. I think you’ll have to ask him about his views of that. I haven’t sat down and said, “Hey, boss, why did you appoint me?” I just assumed that when he said he was serious about wanting a career person that he felt this was an important recognition of the foreign service, and that a career person could adequately do this job. That was enough for me and I, of course, said yes, I’d be delighted to do it.

Q: What are the advantages of having a career officer in the position?

A: I think the advantages of having a career officer in the position are the experience in the issues and knowledge of the people involved. I suppose it is partly fortuitous, but I spent eight years of my career in the Middle East. I spent another eight years in Africa. Both of those have been front-and-center issues. And two years in Central America. All those questions have formed a large part of the daily menu of the work. Not all the issues I deal with are issues that I’m totally familiar with and you have to, obviously, in the foreign service, learn how to become a quick study on questions . . . .

So I would say the advantages that a career person brings are background experience, knowledge, along with acquaintance of many of the people and also a sense of how to deal with foreign diplomats on key and sensitive issues. While a good bit of our bilateral work is not the same as multilateral lobbying, a good bit of it also bears the same sort of relationship. You spend your time as a diplomat trying to convince the other side that you have the right answer.

Q: Do you think that political appointees, like a Jeane Kirkpatrick, had more involvement in policy-making aspects?

A: I don’t really know, and all those kinds of comparisons are difficult. I felt that, as this process proceeded, I have plenty of opportunity to make my views known. I had lots of opportunity, effectively, to convince the government that the views I thought we should promote were the right ones. And, generally, I’ve been highly satisfied that my opinions have been listened to and taken into account. That doesn’t mean I’ve won on every issue, but I feel the prosecution of events here has adequately reflected my sense not only of the tactics, but also of the policy options we should choose . . . .

Q: I’m curious about your Swahili. Do you use it with the Tanzanian ambassador?

A: Oh, yes . . . . There are an increasingly large number of perm reps (permanent representatives) at the U.N. who have more than a nodding acquaintance with the language. Interestingly enough, one ambassador here was a high-school student in Zanzibar when I was there and remembers buying tickets to a play, or having me buying tickets to a play, in Swahili, from him. So it’s amazing, the number of sort of closet and not-so-closet speakers of Swahili hanging around this place. It’s a great fraternity.