I, FOR ONE, would feel a lot happier if James C. Thomson were Secretary of State.

Now an assistant professor of History here, Thomson spent seven years in Washington--as an assistant to Chester Bowles and later as an East Asian expert in the State Department and the White House--trying to wield what influence he could in the formulation of American policies in Asia.

Through his lectures in History 171 and during his testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in February, Thomson has expressed the need for a rethinking of our China policy. He favors "taking all necessary steps toward recognition of China." The failure of policy-makers within the government to come to grips with this problem, Thomson explains, is one of the reasons he left Washington in mid-1965.

In last month's Atlantic, Thomson tells of some of the bureaucratic difficulties of decision-making. The article attempts to account for State Department policy in terms of the motivations of the men that make it.

Thomson discusses the problems of "executive fatigue" and the inertia and "curator mentalities" of many officials as crucial factors in our Vietnam and larger Asian policy. He tells of the "domestication of dissenters" (one employer, Thomson wrote, used to refer to him as his "favorite dove"). And he describes the "effectiveness trap" which "keeps men from speaking out, as clearly or often as they might," in order "to preserve their effectiveness" as another factor leading to the kind of freezing of ideas that is so prevalent in Washington.

Although the reaction to his article was over-whelmingly congratulatory (John Kenneth Gal-braith, in a letter to the Atlantic, said it was the finest political article he had read in many years), Thomson said he had received one letter from a former top-ranking Washington policy-maker, criticizing him for breaking the faith and trust of internal governmental activity.

"I don't agree that service under a President requires you to keep faith forever with that President even when he is leading the nation to the brink of disaster," Thomson said. "At that point I would invoke a higher ethic."

THOMSON takes a very critical stand about United States policy towards Asia. He says we have "over-militarized all our Asian commitments," of which Vietnam is only the most costly and most obvious example.

He would like to see us get out of Vietnam by "talking the issue to death." His hope is that "both sides will become entrapped in the negotiating process."

"Negotiations are like a compression chamber," Thomson says. "Once you get in it, the pressure comes from all sides to reduce your grandiose objectives. And it also becomes very hard to break off talks once you have started them. I think all of us should press very hard for talks.

"I am in favor of anything that would reduce the polarized situation that we are now in, anything that will allow us an umbrella for graceful withdrawal," he continues. "The look of the situation is more important than the content. If the look is ungraceful or dishonorable we may face really severe recriminations at home, and that would be really tragic."

The "look" of the situation gave Thomson some difficult moments earlier this month. "I decided not to sign the CRIMSON advertisement," Thomson said, referring to a two-page Faculty Statement in support of draft resisters, "because of the March 31 speech. It struck me that it was inappropriate at a time when the government is on a 'peace' track to offer encouragement for those who are attempting to resist that government. I found that a very difficult decision to make."

But he said he had "tremendous respect" for the courage of those who are willing to go to jail, and is "willing to give all forms of support for their reintegration into American society once they have paid the price for breaking the law."

THOMSON brings an interesting background to the study of American-East Asian relations. The son of American missionaries in China, he spent most of his formative years in China.

"But those years would have been a pleasant nostalgic blur," he said, had he not gone back to China in 1948, the year before he entered Yale. "I went ostensibly to attend the University of Nanking, but that fall the roof fell in."