John D. Law

By George F. Smalley

As you would expect from a first-rate journalist, editor and author, John D. Law writes with all the precision of a Swiss watch, and never hesitates to spend time teaching his techniques to eager young writers. Never, he says, write something you don't fully understand, and always choose your words very carefully. Following that advice, if you had to describe Mr. Law's own career in only one word you would have to call it unique, for probably no American has traveled to as many places in the Middle East as frequently, and over as long a continuous period of time, as he has.

For close to 30 years John Law was a foreign correspondent, first for United Press (now UPI) and then for U.S. News & World Report, covering the entire Middle East and North Africa non-stop during most of that time. He wrote his first stories on the Mideast in 1948 and started covering the region full-time in 1953, the same year that Dwight Eisenhower began his presidency. By the time President Eisenhower completed his second term in 1960, Mr. Law already had visited every state and principality in the Arab world at least once, from Mauritania in northwest Africa, to Oman, 4,500 miles east, and all seven of what are now the United Arab Emirates. He revisited most of these countries on numerous occasions in the years that followed.

Traveling Constantly to Get the News

As the chief Middle East correspondent for U.S. News from 1953 to 1974, Mr. Law says he traveled constantly, going from the scene of one big development to the next. "If there was a summit conference in Algeria, or a war in Iraq, or some oil crisis in Riyadh, I was there," he says, "year in and year out." He was in Cairo, for example, when the PLO was established in 1964. He was also in Cairo during the 1956, 1967 and 1973 Arab-Israeli wars—the only Western correspondent, he adds, who can make that claim. In all, he figures he covered 16 major conflicts—both in and around the Mideast—not including revolutions, coups, or civil disturbances.

One of his favorite stories goes back to 1958, when he was waiting at the Beirut airport for a flight to Amman to follow up a promising lead. But the breaking story, he soon learned, was unfolding right there at the airport, as the huge hulks of ships suddenly began appearing in the Mediterranean. As soon as he saw the U.S. Navy markings he rushed to the beach to be the first to greet the more than 10,000 U.S. Marines who had been ordered there by President Eisenhower to help bring calm to Beirut.

But this scoop was just one of many. He was told by aides to Yasser Arafat that he was the first American correspondent to get an appointment with the PLO chairman, who at the time (1968) was still underground. No other reporters he knew of, says Mr. Law, had even heard of Yasser Arafat. In 1954 Mr. Law became the first American reporter to have a long interview with Egyptian President Nasser. Other leaders he interviewed over the years include President Sadat, the Shah of Iran, Saudi King Faisal, King Hussein of Jordan, and Syrian President al-Assad.

John Law had decided before graduating from Princeton University in 1948 (after serving four years in the Army) that he wanted to become a foreign correspondent. Instead of taking a job in the U.S. as a reporter with a domestic beat and eventually getting sent overseas, he decided to "mainline it." He shipped off to Europe and within a couple of weeks had landed a job with United Press in Paris.

Putting Knowledge to Work in the States

That was 37 years ago, but today, at 61, Mr. Law still works as hard as ever—both in the office and on the tennis court, when he has time to play. Over the last 11 years, since leaving U.S. News, he has put his encyclopedic knowledge of the Mideast to use in a variety of ways. From 1977 to 1979 he was vice president of Chase World Information—then a subsidiary of Chase Manhattan Bank—and one of a dozen or so senior advisors to the bank on Middle East concerns. Also, he was editor-in-chief of its publications on economic development, including MidEast Markets and East-West Markets.

In 1981, after several years of freelance writing and consulting, Mr. Law took some ideas he had been developing for a newsletter to the newly-formed American Educational Trust, and in April, 1982, The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs was born, with Mr. Law as its editor and principal writer for the next 27 months. Today, he is Director of Policy Research at the National Association of Arab Americans and editor of several of its publications.

In his "spare time" he has written three books on Arab finance that are considered by many to be pioneers in their fields: Arab Aid: Who Gets It, For What and How; and two volumes of Arab Investors: Who They Are, What They Buy, and Where. Last year he wrote a comprehensive report on Lebanon for the U.S. Businessmen's Commission on the Reconstruction of Lebanon that drew high praise from U.S. officials.

The "Dean," as Mr. Law came to be called by some of his colleagues in Beirut, now lives in Chevy Chase, Maryland, with his wife Kathleen.

George F. Smalley is Managing Editor of The Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.