Foreign aid has fallen upon bad times. In President Johnson's aid proposals to Congress last month, he called for emphasis on regionalism, multilateralism, and self-help. But the President failed to back up his rhetoric with substantial and concrete suggestions. At best, Johnson presented a politically palatable bill.

Although regionalism was one of the President's key concepts, his treatment of group grants was superficial. Johnson merely said that America should promote "regional economic development to the maximum extent consistent with the economic and political realities of each region." His practical suggestions were limited to encouraging cooperation in Africa.

Johnson might have pointed out the specific advantages of regionalism--economies of scale and coordination of sector growth--in providing underdeveloped countries with transportation, communications, and other requirements for economic take-off. The President should also have realized that practical regionalism involves considerable political sacrifices to development criteria on the part of both Congress and recipient countries. Congress might have to help a somewhat unfriendly country if it were located in the middle of an optimum region for economic growth. And once regions were established, legislators could not halt aid to a specific country without hurting growth in several other small states. On the other hand, small states might have to overcome traditional tribal or religious conflicts in order to benefit from regional aid.

Matched Munificence

The complement of consolidating recipient countries is grouping donors. The President proposed that eighty five per cent of American foreign aid be given within a "multilateral" framework. Johnson defines multilateralism in two ways. First, he requires the matching of American grants by other industrial countries. According to the President, America would give India as much wheat as Canada, Australia, and Russia together contributed, up to three million tons. Second, the President weakly insisted that we "redouble our efforts" to finance development schemes through neutral institutions like the World Bank and the African Development Bank.

Johnson did not deal with the serious problem involved with his brand of multilateralism. By requiring matched grants, the United States makes developing countries suffer for the stinginess or financial slumps of countries like France, Germany, or Russia. Though the United States wants to channel aid through international institutions, neither the President nor Congress will tolerate the World Bank's rule that it will not administer funds that are tagged for specific countries. And the African Development Bank is presently too inexperienced and understaffed to carry out major investment programs.

Self-help is the third Johnson proposal to make foreign aid more efficient. This cry--"help instead of money"--has been heard before. Drawing directly from Ambassador to Ethiopia Korry's report on African development, Johnson said that America should provide technical assistance rather than money in fields like agricultural techniques, health services and population control.

The President overlooked one money-saving -- and helpful -- proposal, aid through fish flour. Fish flour, recently approved by the Food and Drug Administration, is a colorless, tasteless and odorless protein concentrate made very cheaply from the "trash" fish, hake. Since an estimated two billion persons in underdeveloped countries suffer from lack of protein, Johnson could reasonably have suggested sending fish flour instead of money as foreign aid.

Faney Juggling

Although the foreign aid bill did not show much original thinking or impetus for real change, it was politically attractive--no mean trick in the face of a budget-conscious new Congress. By fancy juggling and his usual pre-shrinking techniques Johnson added $400 million in development loans yet still managed to keep aid appropriations at last year's level--$3.2 billion. The President shifted payments to Laos, Thailand and NATO to the military budget; and held out loans totalling more than $3 million to international organizations like the Asian Development Bank until he could judge more closely the temper of Congress. At the same time Johnson sought to make all unavoidable aid cuts before the bill reached the House floor. As aid specialist William S. Gaud crowed enthusiastically, this is a "tight . . . bikini-type budget."

The President took great pains to make every facet of his proposals appealing to Congress. Regionalism will please those Congressmen who have always felt there are too many little countries to keep track of in Asia and Africa. Multilateralism will appease those who see spoiled, stingy Europeans leaving the United States to care for the whole world. And help instead of money is a sure winner with Congressmen concerned about the balance of payments, interested in promoting domestic agriculture and fishing, or just plain grumbly about the idea of giving money away.

Johnson will need all his political tricks to get the aid bill through Congress. Aid-chopping Representative Otto ("The Terrible") Passman has vowed to sweat the President's request down to a slim $1 billion. In the House last year, only two votes kept the aid bill from being sent back to committee to be cut some more. Now thirty-three members who supported the Administration's proposals have lost their seats. While there is no way of telling how the fifty-seven now Republican Representatives will vote, most likely they will not be very friendly to the bill.

On the Senate side of the Hill, Foreign Relations Committee chairman J. William Fulbright will probably retaliate against the President's authorization of development loans to nineteen additional countries. Under a stipulation in last year's aid bill, only ten countries were supposed to receive development loans, although the President could up this number, "in the national interest." Fulbright feels the President overextended his privilege.

Johnson has put together a high-sounding, unoriginal package calculated to delight Congress, and called it a foreign aid bill. Yet even this package may not pass without severe cuts. Foreign aid may have to wait out the Vietnam War for better days.