Lucius D. Battle

Lucius D. Battle is one of those people who seem to have been everywhere, known everyone, and done everything. Right now, the place he is living and working in is Washington, the people he knows are anybody who is anybody, and what he is doing is serving as Chairman of the Johns Hopkins Foreign Policy Institute (FPI).

Mr. Battle wonders out loud whether he should be written about on a page like this one. "I'm not what you would call an old Middle East hand," he says. Perhaps not. But during a crowded and colorful career of service in the public and private sectors, he managed to find time to serve nearly three years (1964-67) as U.S. Ambassador to Egypt, a year and a half (in 1967 and 1968) as U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near East and South Asian Affairs and another year and a half (in 1973 and 1974) as President of the Middle East Institute (MEI). Along the way, he was a trustee of the American University in Cairo, Chairman of the Visiting Committee for the Center for Middle Eastern Studies of Harvard College, and member of the Advisory Board of the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies of Georgetown University.

Honing His Interest

Today, nearly a decade since his last fulltime, Middle East-related job, Mr. Battle continues to hone his interest in the area. He still serves on the MEI board, and has become chairman of the National Committee to Honor the Fourteenth Centennial of Islam. He gives talks on Middle East subjects, moderates discussions and allows himself to be interviewed by the media for his views on the area.

Would it be correct to say that he has been captivated by the Middle East? He answers with a laugh and a dash of hyperbole: "Obsessed would probably be more accurate!"

Right now, though, his professional duties transcend one region alone. The FPI, which he joined in 1980, has a global mandate. Forming part of the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), it is a non-partisan, independent research center for academicians, businessmen, journalists, public officials and others who seek to work out viable solutions to various international problems. Like other such institutions, it sponsors conferences and roundtables, funds research projects and publishes papers. It is able to draw on the considerable resources of SAIS, which include a 95,000-volume library, and 30 full-time and 60 part-time professors.

Mr. Battle seems in his element in what he calls his "first whack at academia." He is surprised to be asked if he likes the job. "I've never believed in doing anything that I didn't like," he says.

The story of his career certainly reads that way. After State Department tours in Copenhagen, Paris and Washington—where he served a memorable four years as special assistant to then Secretary of State Dean Acheson—he retired in 1956 to join the group which restored Colonial Williamsburg, handling its educational, public relations and cultural programs. He returned to State in 1961 as special assistant to Secretary Dean Rusk, then left again to accept appointment by President Kennedy as Assistant Secretary for Educational and Cultural Affairs. After turning down more than one offer of an ambassadorship, he says, because he wanted to stay in Washington, he was prevailed upon by President Johnson to leave the cultural post—"culture was not one of Johnson's great interests," Mr. Battle deadpans and become Ambassador to Egypt. Mr. Battle did not believe he was well qualified at the time, but says Johnson "wanted someone with a fresh approach who was not locked into any particular point of view." And it was from there that his intense interest in Middle East affairs began to sprout.

Switching to Satellites

Mr. Battle resigned once again from State in 1967 and had two tours as a top officer for the Communications Satellite Corporation—quite a switch. During one of the tours, in February 1977, he says President Carter asked him to be Ambassador to Iran. "Needless to say," he adds, "that's one I'm really glad I didn't take."

You can get the flavor of Mr. Battle's life by noting the boards on which he has served or serves. Aside from his Middle East affiliations, he has been trustee of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and of the Washington Gallery of Modern Art; President of the American Foreign Service Association, Vice Chairman of Meridian House International, Chairman of St. Albans School and a member of the Chapter of the Washington Cathedral. At the moment, he is President of Bacon House Foundation, a trustee of the George C. Marshall Research Foundation, and a director of the Foreign Policy Association and the World Affairs Council of Washington, D.C. He serves on the National Board of the Smithsonian Associates and on the Board of Governors of the Metropolitan Club of Washington, D.C.

Now 64, Mr. Battle is not sure how long he will stay in his present position, but is sure of two things: he will not return to government service, and he will not retire. "I like diversity," he says. "When it is time to move on, I will."