Scott Reynolds ndia, the world's largest democracy, held its eighth national election in the first week of January. It was an election surrounded by extraordinary excitement: the failure of two governments to secure the confidence of the Lok Sabha, the House of Representatives; disputed constitutional decisions by India's head of state, President Sanjiva Reddy; a midterm dissolution of Parliament; an unusually long period of caretaker government between last August's dissolution and the January polls. The results were equally exciting: an overwhelming victory for Indira Gandhi—and, not incidentally, a complementary victory for Sanjay Gandhi.

As the election date drew near, Sanjay Gandhi had become the most controversial public personality for one-sixth of the world's population, the 650 million people of India. In the labyrinthine world of Indian politics, where images are often etched in the muted tones of consensus appeal, Sanjay stands in bold relief; neutrality is an emotion he rarely evokes.

We can count on injustice in human affairs; on privilege, exploitation, and violence. Violence, which in its ability to turn a human being into a thing, inflicts the final injustice.

But we can count, too, on men and social movements to challenge and so to limit this grim reality. In one era a revived religious or political tradition, in another a movement of the oppressed, but in every time some men will affirm dignity and brotherhood and the possibility of community across national, racial, and ideological barriers.

It is a tragic moment in history when such people lose their bearings; when the ideas and goals that inspired them fundamentally alter; when an accurate assessment of their spiritual health is Nietzsche's “1 have forgotten why ever I began.”

Since the proclamation of the State of Israel thirty-one years ago, the Middle East has been in permanent crisis, more or less violent, with one war following another. It is no exaggeration to say, however, that no crisis in the past was as menancing as the present one. Some of my Israeli friends know more about the details of the situation from the Israeli point of view than I—inflation going beyond 100 per cent, the growing abyss between a small, rich minority that is getting richer and the vast majority getting poorer, the growing polarization of the inner political scene and, internationally, the total isolation of Israel, supported only by the USA, primarily for internal political reasons, especially in view of the approaching presidential election.

The Egyptian-Israeli peace process is 95 per cent irreversible.” That is the professional assessment of Hedayat Abdel Nabi, the American- educated diplomatic, correspondent for Al-Ahram and interviewer for Cairo's “Voice of Peace” radio program, with whom I spoke in Cairo some months ago.

Peace is indeed very popular In Egypt. While the 99.9 per cent approval President Anwar el-Sadat received in a recent referendum understates the opposition, his peace policy enjoys the backing of a substantial majority of the general population. This includes, to all indications, the armed forces, whose loyalty remains a crucial element in the stability of the regime.

No aspect of our foreign relations produces more yawns on Main Street or occasional discomfort along Pennsylvania Avenue than our programs of economic assistance to developing countries. If we rather arbitrarily date the beginnings of that effort to coincide with President Truman's Point Four Inaugural, we are now in the thirty-first year of an enterprise that has already cost us more than $150 billion, with no end in sight. As to results, the general feeling is one of frustration, of being overwhelmed and undercompensated. It does not help to have other international and domestic problems clamoring for attention while one developing country after another denounces either our indifference or our interference. Instead of success and gratitude we seem to be reaping continuous foreign policy debacles amongst erstwhile or current Third World aid recipients—from Nicaragua and Mexico to Afghanistan and Iran.

The world of espionage, we have been given to understand, is drab, sordid, and lumpenbourgeois. Base motives dominate, vile acts are common, and agents bespeak cynicism and weariness. This is the tradition of spy fiction, developed long ago by masters like Conrad. It is also, however, no more than a milieu, and in spying it is important not to be misled by appearances.

Spies deceive, and the fictions a spy novelist writes are deceptions about deceivers. Subterfuge is the business of the art, and John le Carre's political teaching is a good deal subtler than many critics imagine. It is not true, for example, that le Carre's heroes are—as Michael Wood described them—all “glum, deceived…[and] tired of spying.” In fact, George Smiley's people yearn for the harness. “Thank you,” Otto Leipzig tells the widow Ostrakova, who sets the plot in motion, “for calling me to arms.” General Vladimir, the old emigre, almost races to his doom.