Dag Hammarskjold

When Dag Hammarskjold first accepted the position of Secretary-General of the United Nations, he said: "Fate is what we make it." The fate which he suffered last week resulted ironically and tragically from his effort to fulfill the role he outlined in 1953: to be "an instrument, a catalyst, an inspirer," to facilitate cooperation among nations.

Mr. Hammarskjold stepped from obscurity to fill this role with a talent the world had not yet recognized. An expert on finance whose translations of French verse won critical acclaim, he combined the resourcefulness of a diplomat with the vision of a poet. His vision, the philosophy of international cooperation which inspired his many expeditions of mediation and reconciliation, including his fatal mission to the Congo, found its fullest expression in the document which turned out to be his final testament to the world. In the report which he was to have submitted to the General Assembly upon his return from Africa, Mr. Hammarskjold contrasted two concepts of the authority and function of the United Nations. Some members, he said, regard the U.N. as "a static conference machinery for resolving conflicts of interest;" others conceive of it as "a dynamic instrument of governments" which not only seeks reconciliation, but attempts to develop "forms of executive action" to forestall conflicts.

Mr. Hammarskjold emphasized that the static concept, that of a sounding-board for accusations, a sort of international steam valve, applies "to history and to the traditions of national policies of the past." But an international forum, which represented a tremendous advance 15 years ago, is no longer sufficient. Only a dynamic organization, in which governments unite for "more developed and increasingly effective forms of constructive international cooperation," can meet the challenges of a world which possesses the power of self-annihilation.

The selection of Mr. Hammarskjold as Secretary-General on March 31, 1953, was hailed by the press as the first important action in nearly two years on which the United States and the Soviet Union agreed. Agreement was possible because delegates felt that the little-known Swedish diplomat was a capable administrator who would run the organization efficiently without stepping on anyone's toes.

These delegates were wrong, of course. If Dag Hammarskjold had been no more than an efficient administrator, his organization--and theirs, and all the world's--might have quietly sunk into oblivion in the troubled waters of the world. That the United Nations still exists today, that after 15 years it offers achievement and potential far beyond that of any previous international organization, is due in no small part to the successes and ideals of an international public servant who lost his life in its service.

The diplomats who are laboring to find a successor to Mr. Hammarskjold face a far more difficult task than those who chose the successor to Trygvie Lie, for the Soviet Union will accept no single man for the position. The fate of the program Hammarskjold espoused, that of "reconciliation and realistic construction," will be determined by three "blocs," the interests of which are seemingly too diverse to make agreement possible.

In reality, though, as both President Kennedy and the leaders of the noncommitted nations recognize, all blocs share a common interest--survival. The organization Mr. Hammarskjold outlined would grant to an "international public servant" an international staff which would implement the decisions of a body determined not only to "save succeeding generations from the scourge of war," but to bring to underdeveloped areas the material comforts which the Western world has enjoyed for the past two centuries.

In the poisoned atmosphere of the current session, the task seems impossible. Yet the U.N. must feel, as Hammarskjold did in a meditative mood several crises ago, when he quoted Shelley: that one should "hope 'til hope creates from its own wreck the thing it contemplates."