In 1958, political scientist Eugene Burdick and naval officer William Lederer published The Ugly American, a series of interconnected vignettes that together offer a scathing critique of America’s foreign policy in Southeast Asia. The political novel centers around American presence in the fictional Asian nation of Sarkhan, though it also features stories set in Vietnam, Burma, and Cambodia. Although the stories are fictional, they reflect actual historical events, and several characters have specific real-life counterparts. Altogether, the stories expose and explain the failure of America’s Foreign Service and diplomatic efforts. Through its many vignettes, The Ugly American argues that the American Foreign Service fails because it employs arrogant and ignorant people, favors impressive-sounding projects over effective solutions, and fails to support innovative and committed thinkers.
The American government staffs its Foreign Service with career politicians and well-educated figures, but they are self-centered, pompous, and ignorant, demonstrating that people with impressive credentials are not necessarily well-qualified for work abroad. The novel opens with “the Honorable Louis Sears, American Ambassador to Sarkhan.” Sears is a career politician (meaning he spends his entire career in political or government roles) whose political party assigns him to work in Sarkhan until a post opens up for him as a judge in America. Sears cannot speak the language and knows nothing about foreign policy or Sarkhanese culture, suggesting that he has no interest in actually helping Sarkhan or even advancing an American agenda there. Rather, Sears spends the majority of his time in his mansion, which is staffed with servants, complaining that the local Sarkhanese newspapers make him look bad. As a result, Prince Ngong, a Sarkhanese official, regards Sears as “more stupid than most.” This suggests that many of America’s Foreign Ambassadors are unqualified and poor representatives of the United States—by Prince Ngong’s assessment, they’re all stupid, but Sears is even “more stupid.” Another American in the Foreign Service, Joe Bing, is beloved by his American contemporaries for being loud, befriending important people, and throwing wild parties. However, Burmese reporter Ruth Jyoti notes that Joe Bing seems outrageous and boorish to Asian sensibilities. She states, “Generally Americans in Asia are not effective […] They feel that if the nice rich respectable people like them, they are doing a good job,” suggesting that such people put all their energy into being well-liked, rather than doing their jobs well. Both Joe Bing and Louis Sears embody the elite, well-educated career politician who is nevertheless arrogant and inept and poorly represents the United States, implying that the Foreign Service is rife with such people.
Although the American government invests money into developing countries, The Ugly American points out that it prioritizes projects that merely sound impressive over ones that will actually help people in practical, tangible ways. Although Cambodia, Burma, Vietnam, and Sarkhan are all rural, agricultural countries, the American government only wants to undertake large-scale projects like building massive dams and military roads. Though they sound impressive, such projects do little to support the agrarian peasants. Homer Atkins, an American engineer, goes to Vietnam to consult for the American government on building roads. However, after traveling through the rural countryside, Atkins declares, “You don’t need dams and roads […] You ever hear of a food shortage being solved by someone building a military highway designed to carry tanks and trucks?” With this, Homer Atkins suggests that America’s resources should go towards supporting the Vietnamese people in ways that make practical sense for their lifestyle and landscape—the American government’s plan to slap their own grandiose solutions on the country is not only ineffective but laughable.
However, when presented with practical and efficient solutions, the American government often demurs. Tom Knox, an American chicken farmer, develops a cost-effective plan to introduce several American breeds into Cambodia’s chicken population, strengthening their weak chicken stock and raising the country’s egg production by 200 percent. For two years, Knox petitions his superiors to fund his plan, but they think it will take too long and does not sound impressive enough. They tell him, “What our two governments want is something big, that really helps people right away”—ignoring the fact that dams and roads take a long time to build, and still wouldn’t help anyone when they are finished—implying that the American Foreign Service will not even back effective and affordable initiatives that its own people develop.
However, more than just refusing to support effective projects, the American government opposes people who want to reform the Foreign Service and make it more effective. When Tom Knox’s superiors won’t support his chicken plan, he angrily resolves to go to Washington, D.C., and make a scene so that the government will see the need for more effective Foreign Service workers. To prevent Knox from causing trouble for them in D.C., his superiors and their French partners send him on a luxurious trip through Asia and Europe. By the time Knox reaches the U.S., he forgets what he was angry about and contentedly retires. Knox’s superiors basically buy him off to reduce trouble for themselves, suggesting that they not only inhibit effective and intelligent people, but even actively undermine them. Louis Sears’s replacement, Gilbert MacWhite, is intelligent and forthright. As an ambassador, MacWhite travels around Southeast Asia and recognizes the weakness of the entire American Foreign Service. He draws up a list of new requirements for Foreign Service workers, stating that they must be fluent in the local language, study local history and culture, and so on. However, the American Secretary of State calls MacWhite’s ideas “highly impractical” and forces him to resign. The American government’s removal of MacWhite suggests that it is unwilling to reform its Foreign Service into a capable system, preferring instead to keep career politicians in comfortable, though ineffective, positions.
Related Themes from Other Texts
The Failure of the American Foreign Service ThemeTracker
The Failure of the American Foreign Service Quotes in The Ugly American
“Where the hell is Sarkhan?”
“It’s a small country out toward Burma and Thailand.”
“Now, you know I’m not prejudiced, but I just don’t work well with blacks.”
“They’re not black, they’re brown. Well, if you don’t want it, we can fix you up as a legal assistant to…”
“I’ll take it.”
“Look, John, I told you milk is part of history. If you get this crazy milk and cattle scheme of yours going, it could in time change the economic balance in Sarkhan.”
“What’s wrong with that? That’s what I want to do.”
“Nothing. It’s a good idea. Out in the bush we’ve talked it over a lot. But you’re the wrong person to be permitted to do it. If it succeeded, the Sarkhanese would believe that America was their savior.”
“I think that the Eastern Star has, perhaps, become somewhat critical of our foreign policy. In particular, it is reluctant to have us grant air bases in this country in exchange for foreign aid. But as a representative of a democratic country, you can surely understand our reluctance to interfere with a free press.”
“The American Ambassador [Sears] is a jewel. He keeps his people tied up with meetings, social events, and greeting and briefing the scores of senators, congressmen, generals, admirals, under-secretaries of State and Defense, and so on, who come pouring through here to ‘look for themselves.’ He forbids his people to ‘go into the hills,’ and still annoys the people of Sarkhan with his bad manners.”
“Vinich had made elaborate plans before he smuggled himself into Anthkata. He had developed a thorough plan for the extermination of the Communist Farmer. And he took steps to assure that his presence in Anthkata would not be known. He had discovered ling ago that natives should do their own political work… foreigners should come in only as a last resort, and then always as quietly as possible.”
“But you have to know Joe Bing. He’s six feet tall, fat, wears Tattersall checked vests. Lots of charm. […] I can remember him sitting in the café at he Hotel Montaigne. Nodded to everyone who went by…”
“Nodded to everyone who was European, Caucasian, western-educated, and decently dressed,” Miss Jyoti said coldly. “I know the bastard now. He drives a big red convertible that he slews around corners and over sidewalks. And he’s got exactly the kind of loud and silly laugh that every Asian is embarrassed to hear.”
The American editor said, “Mr. Ambassador, there’s a story making the rounds that the United States is about to evict the [Sarkhanese] Air Force from land lent to them by the United States. This would mean that all their millions of dollars of building would have to go. The property is supposed to be turned over to American real estate salesmen to sell as subdivisions.
[MacWhite] recognized that he did not know enough about the Asian personality and the way it played politics. There was a strain of coldness, an element of finality, about the whole thing he had never encountered before. Politics in Asia were played for total stakes. He also recognized that he could learn from the experience of others.
“It doesn’t have a thing to do with the quality of the French fighting, or with your Legionnaires […] It’s just that the Communists are fighting by a different rule book. And, like a damn fool, it’s taken me almost a month to remember that I once read it. When I was in Korea, I picked up a book by Mao Tse-tung. Now, Monet, don’t kid yourself about this. Mao is one hell of a bright guy. I hate what he stands for, but he does have a kind of genius.”
“In this section of the Shan States, everyone is pro-American because of the Martins. They came to Burma to help us, not to improve their own standard of living.
You don’t need publicity if the results of what you are doing are visible and valuable to the people. The steam from a good pot of soup is its best advertisement.
You asked me what I would do if I were the President of the United States. This is would I would do: I would send more people like the Martins to Burma. That’s all you’d need. You could forget about the hordes of executives, PX’s, commissaries, and service forces which are now needed to support the Americans abroad.”
“I believe firmly that the Americans could drive the Communists out of Asia in a few years if you really tried and were willing to live life on our level. And if you had a definite policy. But most important—act like Americans. We love Americans—the kind we meet in America.”
To [Tom’s] astonishment Cambodia seemed a long, long time away, and glazed over with wonderful memories. These were not so much memories of the village life, as of the generous and courteous attentions he had been given by so many Cambodians on his trip home. The anger, which in Cambodia had seemed so sure and honest a weapon, in his suite on the Liberté seemed somehow almost ridiculous.
“When I was asked to read palms at the Philippine Ambassador’s dinner, it was a God-given opportunity. All of the Sarkhanese brass except the King were present. And then that knucklehead of an assistant of yours [Swift], instead of helping me, started laughing at me and trying to make a fool out of me. If he had an ounce of brains, he would have noticed how serious the Sarkhanese were. And if those fools in the State Department had briefed him properly, he would have known all about palmistry and astrology before he came here.”
“And don’t kid yourself, gentleman; unless you feel they’re equals and act on that feeling, they’ll never respond. I’ve seen it happen too many times. Make someone feel inferior in a negotiating situation, and he’ll be the toughest guy around the table. Gentlemen, that is where I stand, and that is the way I will run my delegation.
[Atkins’s] hands were laced with big, liverish freckles. His fingernails were black with grease. His fingers bore the tiny nicks and scars of a lifetime of practical engineering. The palms of his hands were calloused. Homer Atkins was worth three million dollars, every dime of which he had earned by his own efforts; but he was most proud and confident of his ugly strong hands. Atkins knew he could always make a living with them.
“You don’t need dams and roads […] Maybe later, but right now you need to concentrate on first things—largely things that your own people can manufacture and use. I don’t know much about farming or city planning or that kind of thing; but I can tell you that your people need other things besides military roads. You ever hear of a food shortage being solved by people building a military highway designed to carry tanks and trucks?”
Mr. Atkins, […] you may not know it, but a French firm has a concession to handle the production of building materials in this country. If everyone started forming brick and quarry companies, it would ruin our relationship.
[Atkins and Jeepo’s] arguments, for some reason, caused the Sarkhanese workmen a great deal of pleasure, and it was not until several months had passed that Atkins realized why—they were the only times that the Sarkhanese had ever seen one of their own kind arguing fairly and honestly, with a chance of success, against a white man.
“Can you imagine, Dr. Barre, the injury that might be done to American foreign policy if the Senator were to take seriously some of the nonsense uttered to him by a native?”
“Senator, [the Vietnamese woman] says it’s safer in the city. She says that the French will take care of her while the Communists would probably slaughter her. She says she would rather leave the Delta forever than live there under Communism,” Dr. Barre said.
What the woman had actually said was that the French and the Communists were both dogs. The Communists had cruelly slaughtered her eldest son six months before. The French, just as cruelly, had burned down her hut to open a firing lane through her village.
“The Russians will win the world by their successes in a multitude of tiny battles. Many of these will be fought around conference tables in the rice fields of Asia, at village meetings, in schools; but mainly they will take place in the minds of men. Only occasionally will the battles be violent; but the sum of these tiny battles will decide whether our way of life is to perish or exists.”
The little things we do must be moral acts and they must be done in the real interest of the peoples whose friendship we need—not just in the interest of propaganda. […] To the extent that our foreign policy is humane and reasonable, it will be successful. To the extent that it is imperialistic and grandiose, it will fail.
