A Reaganite on Reagan’s Foreign Policy : INSIDE THE NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL The True Story of the Making and Unmaking of Reagan’s Foreign Policy<i> by Constantine C. Menges (Simon & Schuster:$19.95; 356 pp.) </i>

This is an important book by a man who was at the heart of America’s national-security apparatus from 1983 to 1986. An insider’s account, it is written with the eye of a scholar, the craftsmanship of a skilled writer, and the knowledge of someone who was there. If you want to curl up some evening and immerse yourself in the intramural political infighting of the national-security bureaucracy, this is the book. In detail and depth it tells the story of one man’s fight, somewhat handicapped by a sense of honor and decency that did not weigh down some of his opponents, to affect the course of foreign policy.

Constantine Menges is not bashful about telling us how many times he correctly forecast the turn of events in foreign policy--the upheaval in Iran in the late 1970s, the danger of the communist Sandinistas, the threat to El Salvador--or of some of the key events in which his ideas and judgments played an important role--for example, the liberation of Grenada. What emerges is a portrait of a young man with a brilliant sense of foreign policy who smashes head-on into a wily, stubborn bureaucracy and colleagues who consider themselves every bit as brilliant as he, and who often and regularly disagree with and disdain his counsel.

One important theme that runs throughout the book is Menges’ belief in the classical view of the White House staffer--someone who clearly understands that the role of a presidential aide is to assist the President in making policy, not to make it himself, someone who has a passion for anonymity, someone who is not shy about telling the President the bad news as well as the good news. He disagrees with the view of Robert McFarlane, Reagan’s third national security adviser, that “our job here at the NSC is mainly clerical.” Menges argues passionately that the job of the NSC staff is, first and foremost, to “make sure the President is really in charge of foreign policy,” and that to do this the NSC staff must “keep him supplied with full information, monitor the agencies so they carry out his decisions, (and) call attention to new opportunities and threats.” It’s an old-fashioned view, but it is right.

Many of the tales he tells are intriguing, especially when he is talking about those who operated on his own sub-Cabinet level. His portraits of the people and insights into their actions are quite perceptive, at least judging by his view of people whom I know. His judgment of one person in particular, Oliver North (whom I do not know personally), should raise more than one or two eyebrows. It is a blistering, devastating critique, which he sums up as “North’s dark side.” He flatly accuses North of lying--again and again--about things small and large, and this from a man who worked closely with North for almost four years. Menges quotes another colleague on the Reagan National Security Council staff, Jacqueline Tillman, who rips North’s character saying that “not only is he a liar, but he’s delusional, power hungry, and a danger to the President and the country. He should not be working on the NSC staff.” That judgment was rendered in 1984, long before the Iran-Contra affair exploded. In fact, the description of North spun by Menges comes close to portraying a psychopath who either by terrible judgment or cunning design misled and finally betrayed President Reagan.

Menges’ criticisms and praise of those at much higher levels of government--criticism for George Shultz, Robert McFarlane and John Poindexter--praise for William Casey, William Clark, Edwin Meese and Ronald Reagan--are on shakier ground. From his perspective he is probably mostly right, but his perspective is the relatively narrow view of someone looking up. White House staffers as a rule, and Menges is no exception, seem unaware of the mind-numbing number of things a cabinet secretary or national-security adviser must attend to, and the factors they often must account for that their staff will never know about.

Although Menges has a somewhat ambivalent view of George Bush, he does tell one story that clearly and dramatically shows the vice president playing a major role in the making of U.S. foreign policy. On Oct. 20, 1983, while President Reagan was traveling, it was George Bush who chaired the first National Security Council meeting on the question of whether or not to invade Grenada. Menges was present, and although he is highly critical of the State Department on many counts, he does report that it was George Shultz and other State Department representatives who supported military action at this critical meeting. Perhaps the most important parts of the book, and the ones that could have a long-lasting impact on the national-security policy development apparatus, are Menges’ observations on how the policy process was organized. This is usually deadly dull stuff, but not here. Menges repeatedly and persuasively stresses that a 1981 power gambit by Alexander Haig set the die for the foreign-policy problems that plagued and almost brought down the Reagan Administration.

In the upper reaches of the federal bureaucracy, most major policy, both foreign and domestic, is crafted in interdepartmental or interagency committees. And he or she who selects the members of those committees and names the chairmen, who calls the meetings and sets the agenda of what will be discussed, has enormous and effective power over the development of policy. In the area of foreign policy, the State Department, at Haig’s insistence, controlled all interagency committees below the presidential level, whereas in the domestic policy area, including economic policy, all such committees were controlled by the White House staff.

The practical effect of this was that the State Department dominated the making of foreign policy, much to the distress and anguish of the President’s men and women, while the White House staff dominated the making of domestic and economic policy. Over the years, almost no one has seemed to notice the yawning gap in the Reagan Administration between the making of foreign policy and the making of domestic policy. But Menges’ analyses and stories confirm what I have long suspected, that those boring organizational issues in the early days of an administration can have a decisive effect on national policy.

“Inside the National Security Council” is an important addition to the growing bookshelf documenting the Reagan era. Constantine Menges was one of the young revolutionaries who came in with Reagan and left some lasting marks on U.S. policy. History will determine the extent and durability of those marks, but the important thing is that marks were made. At times Menges expresses frustration with the sometimes maddening way that foreign policy was developed, and especially with the lack of appreciation of policies and actions that seemed unarguably desirable to him. He, like so many other young people lucky and talented enough to become intimately involved in national politics, and who--both Republicans and Democrats--do so much for their country, never did come to understand one of the sad, iron rules of politics: never go into politics if you must be appreciated, if you can’t be satisfied with just knowing that what you did was good.