“Mike who?” asked the Senator

Leo A. Falcam, head of the Congress of Micronesia Liaison Office in Washington, is convinced his office is fulfilling a real need. Back home in February, he told COM members: “If the past five months in Washington have taught me nothing else, they have shown me that not only was such an office needed, but that the need for it was more acute than even I had imagined.”

Falcam recalled that one member of the US Senate, when asked about Micronesia, had responded, “Mike who?” He also said that former Secretary of State Kissinger is alleged to have said at one point about Micronesia: “There are only 90,000 people out there who gives a damn?”

Falcam’s observations are confirmed by a PIM correspondent in Washington, who wrote in February: “There could be some Senate action soon to probe allegations that the CIA bugged the local office of the Micronesian delegation to the Marianas talks. Nobody seems to be arguing much here against the proposition that the CIA did it, not even the CIA itself. There is a very pragmatic approach to the whole business the Marianas people wanted Commonwealth association, we (that is, the US) just helped to give it to them.

“There was little US interest in the whole deal when it was shoved through the Senate, and that seems to remain the position now.

“As for US policy in the Pacific generally? Question mark just about sums it up. For a man who said Ford-Kissinger concentrated too much on US- Soviet relations, Carter seems pretty set on the subject. Maybe this will change as things settle down in the State Department, but at present the people concerned with Pacific and East Asian affairs are either not yet confirmed by the Senate or up to their eyeballs in position papers and, in most cases, both. Thus, those who might be in a position to discuss the future shape of Pacific policy are either too busy to talk about it, or would rather keep quiet until the Senate confirms their appointments.”