108. Memorandum From the Assistant Area Directors of the United States Information Agency to the Director (Marks)1
However the concept is expressed in the MOA or anywhere else, the Area offices are your eyes and ears in the field and are operating extensions of your office. We run the field posts in your name. Running them means everything from working with Personnel on staffing the posts to having meaningful contact with the Department on political affairs and participating more and more in complicated Pentagon matters, from war games to counter insurgency.2
We’re all doing the job now one way or another, but none of us is satisfied that we’re doing the best job that could be done; several of us are concerned that we’re not giving you the backstopping you deserve.
The problem: the minimal staffs we have in our Area offices in Washington. We don’t have enough people, and some of those we have aren’t the right level. We are all aware of this, and as foreign affairs become more involved, the situation becomes more critical. USIA’s standards should be high; we want to represent you properly. Too often it’s impossible to do so when one Desk Officer, for instance, has to cover too many countries. We need help!
You have had Herb Fredman and others take close looks at many elements of the Agency, but you have still to examine the Areas. Over the past several weeks the Area Directors have colluded to take a look at their own offices to see what their most urgent personnel needs are. Attached is a list of what we honestly think we need. Ben Posner listened to our deliberations, as did Mose.3
We are aware of the locked-up budget, the personnel ceilings, etc., and the many reasons anybody could cite 4not to increase our staffs. [Page 339] Nevertheless, we think you should be warned that we all feel we can’t do you justice unless we get some help.
However, we think the best way to go at this would be to have a study made of the Area offices to determine in fact the number of additional positions required. Perhaps you could ask Herb Fredman to undertake such a study. This should provide you with an objective picture of our problem.4
- Source: National Archives, RG 306, DIRCTR Files Bx 33–36, 1966: Acc. #69–A–3445 [E], Entry UD WW 193, Box 33, I—The Director’s Office (October through December 1966). No classification marking. The day of the month is handwritten in an unknown hand. Also written in an unknown hand in the upper right-hand corner of the first page of the memorandum are the initials “BW” (Barbara White) and “FYI.”↩
- An unknown hand crossed out the part of the sentence that reads “in complicated Pentagon matters, from war games to counter insurgency” and substituted “in all sorts of related and unrelated affairs from war games to counter insurgency and from PPBS to personnel selection panels.” For additional information on the PPBS, see Foreign Relations, 1964–1968, vol. XXXIII, Organization and Management of Foreign Policy; United Nations, Documents 45 and 80; and Public Papers: Johnson, 1965, Book II, pp. 916–917.↩
- Presumably a reference to Lionel Mosley.↩
- Marks responded to the memorandum in a September 15 memorandum for Area Assistant Directors. In it Marks stated: “Your determination to maintain the highest possible standards for USIA is one I share and I appreciate your coordinated approach to me on this particular problem.” He continued: “Pursuant to the request in your memorandum, I am taking steps immediately to have the personnel needs of the Area offices surveyed and I will discuss the findings with you at the earliest opportunity.” (National Archives, RG 306, DIRCTR Files Bx 33–36, 1966: Acc. #69–A–3445 [E], Entry UD WW 193, Box 33, I—The Director’s Office (October through December 1966))↩
- Printed from a copy that bears these typed signatures.↩
- No classification marking. No drafting information appears on the paper.↩