‘Hatchet Victims’

I agree with your observation that the recent congressional action to curtail the already limited funding for foreign aid programs such as the International Fund for Agricultural Development and UNICEF is evidence that we have yet to recognize how closely the health and well-being of our country is linked to that of other, less prosperous nations.

In seeking to offer a hand-up to less developed countries we not only demonstrate our basic sense of human compassion and thus our regard for others, but we also act from the practical recognition that we are likely to benefit in both material and strategic terms from an improvement in the economic vitality of Third World countries.

Although Congress seems ready to take this shortsighted action, individual congressmen can be persuaded to rethink the issue of foreign aid if pressured to do so by their constituents. I would encourage all who understand that our prosperity must remain incomplete and insecure if elsewhere there is want to write their representatives in Congress and insist that they make foreign aid a high priority.

BERNARDO S. GUZMAN

San Diego