Strengthen America's voice to world

When I was a foreign correspondent in Africa and Asia, the most valued part of my kit after my portable typewriter was a little shortwave radio. It was my link to the outside world in the remotest parts of those continents. Across the static over thousands of miles, I would tune in each night when reception was better, to the news from Voice of America, its rousing familiar introductory chords momentarily stirring pangs of homesickness before it gave me a trusted briefing on what was happening in America and elsewhere in the world.

Years later, when I served as director of Voice of America, my admiration for it was only heightened by my association with the talented journalists, foreign service officers and expatriates from various lands who so carefully gathered the news and broadcast it around the globe in a multitude of tongues. Though it was not directed internally to an American audience, Scotty Reston, the famous New York Times columnist, told me that it was his favorite newscast, and he listened to it every night on a shortwave radio.

Today the typewriter is an anachronism, supplanted by the laptop computer, and many have abandoned shortwave radio in favor of television and more modern methods of communication like the Internet's Web sites.

There is questioning as to whether there is any longer a critical mass for shortwave listening, and whether VOA and the other government radios have outlived their usefulness. Their heyday was in the Cold War, and that is long since gone.

The methods of delivery may change, but the subversive message sent to not-yet-free nations — that all men (and women) have the right to liberty — is as important as ever.

We are engaged in a war against terrorism that President Bush has warned since 9/11 will be long. It requires force of arms but is also a war of ideas. With the lands of Islam the heartland of this war, it is understandable that the focus of institutions like VOA, whether the message be delivered by satellite television, or shortwave, or FM radio, should be directed at them. Sadly this means that language services beamed elsewhere are being cut or abandoned, so that broadcasting to Iran and the Arab countries of the Middle East in their own languages can be increased.

One of the casualties is English-language broadcasting to many parts of the world except Africa. This is unfortunate because even in countries whose native language is not English, English is often the language used by the elite and the leadership, which are an especially desirable target for VOA's programming.