Yugoslavia: Talking to Tito

On his way home after a 16,000-mile swing through Ankara, Teheran, Karachi and New Delhi, U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk squeezed in a short stop in Belgrade. For the diplomatic record, Rusk officially was repaying a 1961 visit to Washington by Yugoslav Foreign Minister Koca Popovic. But there was more to Rusk’s courtesy call than that.

U.S.-Yugoslav relations were never really warm; since the U.S. Congress last summer served notice that it would eliminate Belgrade’s “most favored nation” trading clause this year, they have been positively chilly. Marshal Tito’s ostentatiously friendly trip to Moscow last year did not improve matters, either. But Belgrade was anxious to assure the U.S. that it was officially still “unaligned,” and to smooth things over, Rusk agreed at the last minute to make his visit.

Popovic was out at modern Surcin Airport to greet Rusk when the big U.S. jet touched down. Also on hand was a red carpet and a military band. But that was the end of the fanfare. Since the Yugoslavs do not unfurl foreign flags along the new autoput that leads from the airport to the city except for a visiting chief of state. Rusk’s route was lined with blue-and-white Finnish banners in place for President Urho K. Kekkonen’s arrival next day. There were no crowds at all, since the Yugoslavs did not bother to announce Rusk’s trip in advance.

After lunch with Popovic and a reception at the U.S. embassy given by retiring U.S. Ambassador George Kennan, Rusk paid a call on Tito in his Belgrade villa. Yugoslavia has some 1956 vintage U.S. military equipment for which Tito would like spare parts since 50% of Yugoslavia’s commerce is with the West, it is worried about the rising tariff walls of the six-nation Common Market. Naturally, Tito raised the problem of “most favored nation” status which, if eliminated, could sharply boost import levies on Yugoslavia’s $30 million annual trade with the U.S. Rusk could offer no assurances that the clause would be restored, since the decision is up to Congress. On the whole, it was a pleasant if inconclusive chat. Then, less than 24 hours after he arrived, the Secretary of State, his wife, and 28 aides who had accompanied him on the five-nation trip, packed up and headed for Washington.