Most Americans a month ago had zero awareness of the US Aid Program — what it did; who it benefitted; what it cost. But since Trump and Musk tried to cut off funding for these programs, we have been flooded with information, if we chose to listen, about all the amazing things the Aid program was doing that not only benefited people all round the world, but also spent much of its funds here at home buying produce from our farmers, medicines from our factories and all kinds of other critical items needed desperately by impoverished people around the world. Some of the most important Aid programs were focused on fighting epidemics where they were just getting started, before they could spread around the world, possibly arriving in our own backyard.

I worked in the US Aid Agency in the 1960s when it was being reconstituted, spending two years in Washington in the Policy and Planning Office and then two years in South Korea as Chief Economist in the Aid Mission. The principal architect of this new program, Harvard Professor Edward S. Mason, was very clear about the purpose of the Aid Program.

“The principal purpose of foreign aid in my view is to promote the security of the United States and, insofar as our security is dependent on others, foreign aid is an essential part of a mutual security policy.”

Over the subsequent 65 years the Aid Program has evolved in many ways. Major recipients in the early years, such as South Korea and Taiwan, achieved rapid progress and are now among the highly developed nations that provide aid and technical assistance to less developed countries.

The US Aid Program now consists of a very diverse set of activities tailored much more realistically to the specific needs of individual still-poor countries. And it is these carefully designed, and critically important, programs targeted on specific urgent needs that are now being suspended with devastating consequences. They are not wasteful, they are vital. The screams and warnings being heard around the World reflect real pain and suffering.

Slashing the Aid programs is just one example of applying the chainsaw approach to reshaping our government, but it provides vivid evidence of what we will soon be experiencing from applying the same approach to our own health, education, public safety, environmental, immigration and many other programs here it home. And, on top of that, we are losing our Democracy, our freedom, and our standing in the World.

We are in crisis and imposing our crisis on the rest of the World. We must find a way to stop this desecration.

David C. Cole

Westport